J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


Copyright 


J.   KEIR  HARDIE,  1914 


J.    KEIR    HARDIE 

A  Biography 


By 

WILLIAM  STEWART 

With  an  Introduction  by 

J.  RAMSAY  MACDONALD 


CASSELL  &  COMPANY,  LTD. 
LONDON,  NEW  YORK,  TORONTO,  AND  MELBOURNE 


FIRST  PUBLISHED  OCTOBER,  1921. 


Printed  at  the  London  Works  of 
THE   NATIONAL   LABOUR  PRESS.   LIMITED, 

8,    9,    10    Johnson'3    Court,    Fleet    Street,    EC,  4. 


AUTHOR'S   PREFACE 

THE  one  man  of  all  Keir  Hardie's  associates 
most  fitted  to  write  an  account  of  his  life  and 
work  was  the  late  /.  Bruce  Glasier.  His  know- 
ledge of  the  Labour  and  Socialist  movement  in  all  its 
phases  and  aspects,  his  long  and  close  intimacy  with 
Hardie  both  in  public  and  private  life,  his  sympathetic 
perception  of  the  motives  and  environment  and  heredity 
which  went  to  the  formation  of  Hardie' s  character,  and 
influenced  his  actions,  and  his  own  fine  gift  of  literary 
expression,  qualified  him  above  all  others  to  be  Keir 
Hardie' s  biographer. 

The  Fates  ruled  otherwise.  Before  Mr.  Glasier  had 
begun  to  collect  and  assort  the  material  for  the  work,  he 
was  himself  stricken  with  the  illness,  which,  heroically 
borne  through  two  years  of  pain,  ended  in  his  death.  It 
was  at  Mr.  Glasier' s  request  while  on  his  bed  of  sickness 
that  I ,  not  very  confidently,  undertook  the  work.  7'he 
Memorial  Committee  adopted  Mr.  Glasief  s  suggestion 
that  I  should  be  appointed  to  take  his  place.  The  work 
therefore  came  to  me  both  as  a  request  and  as  a  com- 
mand. I  have  performed  it  to  the  best  of  my  ability ; 
whether  well  or  ill,  must  be  left  to  the  judgment  of  others. 

To  those  friends  who  were  most  familiar  with  Keir 
Hardie' s  habits  of  life  it  will  be  unnecessary  to  explain 
that  the  task  has  not  been  quite  easy.  Thoiigh  he  had  the 
intention  of  some  day  writing  a  book  of  reminiscences, 
the  daily  call  of  the  Labour  and  Socialist  movement  left 
him  without  any  leisiire  to  sit  down  to  it  systematically, 

vii 

45S648 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

and  when  he  died  he  had  not  even  made  that  provision 
for  posthumous  fame  which  seems  customary  with  per- 
sons who  have  figured  in  public  life.  He  kept  no  diary, 
and  he  preserved  few  letters,  though  he  must  have 
received  many  from  important  people.  If  it  be  true, 
as  has  been  said,  that  letters  are  the  raw  material  of 
biography,  this  particular  biography  has  been  produced 
at  a  disadvantage.  That  is  not  entirely  true,  however. 
Mzich  of  the  material  for  a  life  of  Hardie  is  to  be  found 
not  in  his  private  but  in  his  public  writings  which  were 
voluminous,  and,  to  a  considerable  extent,  self -revealing. 
But  the  very  wealth  and  abundance  of  this  kind  of 
material  have  rendered  the  work  difficult  if  interesting. 

I  found  it  necessary  to  go  through  with  some  selective 
care  the  two  volumes  of  "The  Miner"  twenty-one 
volumes  of  the  "Labour  Leader"  several  volumes  of 
the  "Merthyr  Pioneer"  and  also  to  refer  to  other 
Socialist  papers,  to  the  columns  of  the  contemporary 
daily  press,  and  to  the  pages  of  "Hansard" 

There  will  be  differences  of  opinion  as  to  whether 
this  material  has  always  been  used  in  the  best  way,  and 
also  as  to  whether  certain  events  and  episodes  have  been 
over  or  under  emphasised.  These  differences  cannot  be 
helped.  I  had  to  use  my  own  judgment  and  have  done 
so,  and  the  result  must  stand. 

For  information  concerning  the  early  period  of  Keir 
Hardie' s  life  I  am  indebted  to  several  members  of  the 
family,  especially  to  his  brothers,  George,  David  and 
William.  Mrs.  Keir  Hardie  also  was  most  helpful  in 
supplying  those  domestic  details  which  seemed  necessary, 
while  for  some  of  the  early  Ayrshire  experiences  I  have 
to  thank  Councillor  James  Neil  of  Ciimnock,  and 

viii 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

several  quite  obscure  but  sterling  men  of  the  pits  who 
were  associated  with  Hardie  in  his  scantily  recorded 
pioneering  days. 

For  an  account  of  the  historic  Mid-Lanark  election 
there  was  a  fair  amount  of  information  available,  though 
it  had  to  be  dug  out.  Not  so,  however,  with  regard  to 
the  West  Ham  election,  and  I  have  specially  to  thank 
Councillor  Ben  Gardner  for  his  valuable  help  in  this 
connection.  There  is  a  probability  that  he,  and  also  the 
many  Merthyr  friends,  notably  Llewellyn  Francis,  John 
Ban,  Councillor  Stonelake  and  Emrys  Hughes,  may 
think  I  have  not  made  the  fullest  use  of  the  very  valuable 
information  which  they  placed  at  my  disposal.  They 
will,  however,  I  have  no  doubt,  realise  that  I  had  to  be 
governed  by  a  sense  of  proportion,  and  had  to  consider 
each  phase  of  Hardie' s  life  in  its  relation  to  his  whole 
career. 

I  do  sincerely  believe,  however,  that  the  book  as  it 
stands  contains  nearly  all  that  is  essential  to  a  trite 
understanding  of  ^the  character  of  Keir  Hardie  and  of 
his  life  work;  and  thereby  makes  it  possible  for  readers 
to  form  a  just  estimate  of  the  great  service  which  he 
rendered  to  the  working  people,  not  of  his  own  country 
only,  but  of  the  world,  and  therefore  to  Humanity. 

WILLIAM  STEWART. 
September  yth,  1921 . 


IX 


CONTENTS 


Page 

INTRODUCTION  by  J.   RAMSAY  MACDONALD  xv 

Chapter 

1 .  THE  MAKING  OF  AN  AGITATOR i 

2.  JOURNALIST  AND    LABOUR    ORGANISER — "THE  MINER"  17 

3.  MID-LANARK  —  THE   SCOTTISH   LABOUR   PARTY  —  THE 

SOCIALIST  MOVEMENT 35 

4.  THE  SECOND  INTERNATIONAL — WEST  HAM — THE  I.L.P. 

— PARLIAMENT 58 

5.  STANDING  ALONE — THE  MEMBER  FOR  THE  UNEMPLOYED  85 

6.  A   GENERAL  ELECTION — AMERICA — INDUSTRIAL    STRIFE  105 

7.  SOUTH  AFRICAN  WAR — THE  L.R.C. — MERTHYR  TYDVIL  143 

8.  PARLIAMENT  ONCE  MORE — "THE    WHITE    HERALD" — 

SERIOUS  ILLNESS 173 

9.  THE  CLASS  WAR  IN  THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  .         .         .  208 

10.  THE  PARLIAMENTARY  LABOUR  PARTY — PHYSICAL  BREAK- 

DOWN— ROUND  THE  WORLD  .         .         .         .         .221 

1 1.  FOREIGN  POLICY — THE  KING'S  GARDEN  PARTY — ATTACKS 

FROM  WITHIN  AND  WITHOUT 260 

12.  Two  GENERAL  ELECTIONS — INDUSTRIAL  TURMOIL — THE 

BRINK  OF  WAR 290 

13.  SOUTH  AFRICA  AND  IRELAND — COMING-OF-AGE  CONFER- 

ENCE— ARMAGEDDON 326 

14.  THE  LAST  YEAR 350 

CHRONOLOGY          .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .376 

INDEX             379 


LIST  OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

J.  KEIR  HARDIE,  1914,  from  a  photograph  'by 

Walter  Scott Frontispiece 

To  face  page. 

J.   KEIR  HARDIE,    1893 100 

J.  KEIR  HARDIE  IN  HIS  ROOM  AT  NEVILL'S  COURT,  LONDON, 

from  a  photograph  by  Alfred  Barrett  ,         .         .         .196 

J.   KEIR  HARDIE,   1910,  from  a  photograph  by  Annan  and 

Sons  .........     306 


INTRODUCTION 

THE  purposes  of  biography  are  manifold,  but 
they  have  this  common  end  :   to  interpret  the 
subject  and  show  forth  what  manner  of  man  he 
was  of  whom  the  writer  writes.     That  done  faithfully, 
the  biographer  can  launch  his  work  upon  the  waters  and 
trust  to  the  winds  and  the  currents  for  a  prosperous 
voyage. 

But  what  is  "faithfully"?  A  patient  and  accurate 
accumulation  of  facts  and  events  strung  upon  time  as 
boys  used  to  hang  rows  of  birds'  eggs  upon  strings  ?  A 
cold,  impartial  scrutiny  of  a  life  made  from  a  judgment 
seat  placed  above  the  baffling  conflicts  of  doubting 
conscience,  groping  reason  and  weak  desire? 
Biographies  may  be  so  written.  But  the  life  of  him  who 
has  stood  in  the  market  place  with  a  mission  to  his 
fellows,  who  has  sought  to  bring  visions  of  greater 
dignity  and  power  into  the  minds  of  the  sleeping  and 
vegetating  crowds,  who  has  tried  to  gather  scattered  and 
indifferent  men  into  a  mighty  movement  and  to  elevate 
discontented  kickings  against  the  pricks  into  a  crusade 
for  the  conquest  of  some  Holy  Land,  cannot  be  dealt 
with  in  that  way.  He  must  submit  to  the  rigid  scrutiny; 
the  dross  that  is  in  him,  the  mistakes  and  miscalculations 
which  he  made,  must  be  exposed  with  his  virtues, 
wisdoms  and  good  qualities.  But  to  portray  such  a 
man,  the  biographer  has  not  only  to  scrutinise  him 
objectively;  he  must  also  tell  how  he  appeared  to,  and 
was  felt  by,  the  people  who  were  influenced  by  him,  and 
preserve  for  the  future  the  hero  or  the  saint  who  received 
the  homage  of  leadership  and  the  worship  of  affection. 
The  glamour  of  the  myth  gathers  round  all  great  popular 

xv 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

leaders  and  becomes  an  atmosphere  as  real  to  their 
personality  as  the  colour  of  cloud  and  sun  is  real  to  a 
landscape.  Were  we  to  separate  what  is  inseparable,  we 
might  say  that  such  a  man  has  two  beings,  that  which 
the  critic  alone  can  see,  dissecting  him  as  though  he 
lay  a  lifeless  thing  upon  a  table,  and  that  which  the 
artist  sees  regarding  him  as  one  of  the  living  formative 
forces  of  his  time. 

In  the  latter  way  the  biography  of  Keir  Hardie  must 
be  treated  if  it  is  to  be  a  full  interpretation  of  the  man. 
Mr.  Stewart,  who  has  done  this  book,  writes  of  his  hero, 
frankly  and  unashamedly,  as  a  worshipper.  He  is  a 
disciple  who  for  many  years  has  enjoyed  the  intimacy  of 
his  master,  and  he  sees  with  the  eye  and  writes  with  the 
pen  which  reveal  the  inspiring  leader  to  us.  He  has 
gathered  from  a  great  mass  of  details  the  outstanding 
incidents  in  Hardie's  life,  and  through  the  deeds  has 
shown  the  man.  He  has  also  preserved  for  all  who  may 
read  his  book,  and  especially  for  those  in  whose 
memories  those  precious  days  of  pioneering  have  no 
place,  the  inspiration  that  made  the  work  possible  and 
brought  forth  from  chaos  the  Labour  Movement. 

Everyone  who  came  in  contact  with  Hardie  felt  his 
personality  right  away  at  the  outset.  His  power  never 
lay  in  his  being  at  the  head  of  a  political  organisation 
which  he  commanded,  for  the  organisation  of  the  Inde- 
pendent Labour  Party  was  always  weak  compared  with 
its  influence,  and  he  had  ceased  to  be  an  official  of  the 
miners  before  their  combination  became  really  formid- 
able; nor  did  it  lie  in  his  ability  to  sway  the  crowd  by 
divine  gifts  of  speech  and  appeal,  for  his  diction  though 
beautifully  simple  was  rarely  tempestuous,  and  his  voice 
had  few  of  the  qualities  that  steal  into  the  hearts  of  men 
and  stir  them  in  their  heights  and  depths;  more  certainly 
still  he  never  secured  a  follower  by  flattery  nor  won  the 

xvi 


INTRODUCTION 

ear  of  a  crowd  by  playing  down  to  it.  He  set  a  hard  task 
before  his  people  and  gave  them  great  ends  to  pursue. 
He  left  no  man  in  peace  in  the  valley  gutter,  but  winded 
them  on  the  mountain  tracks.  What  then  was  the 
secret  of  the  man  ?  I  who  have  seen  him  in  all  relation- 
ships, at  the  height  of  triumph  an3  the  depths  of 
humiliation,  on  the  platform  and  at  the  fireside,  dignified 
amongst  strangers  and  merry  amongst  friends, 
generally  fighting  by  his  side  but  sometimes  in  conflict 
with  him,  regard  that  secret  as  first  of  all  his  personality 
and  then  his  proud  esteem  for  the  common  folk  and  his 
utter  blindness  to  all  the  decorations  of  humanity.  He 
was  a  simple  man,  a  strong  man,  a  gritty  man. 

Hardie  was  of  the  "old  folk."  Born  in  a  corner  of 
Scotland  where  there  still  lingered  a  belief  in  the 
uncanny  and  the  superhuman,  where  Pan's  pipes  were 
still  heard  in  the  woods,  the  kelpie  still  seen  at  the  fords 
and  the  fairy  still  met  with  on  the  hills,  and  born  in  the 
time  of  transition  when  the  heart  and  imagination  paid 
homage  whilst  the  reason  was  venturing  to  laugh,  he  went 
out  into  the  world  with  a  listening-  awe  in  his  soul; 
brought  up  in  surroundings  eloquent  with  the  memory 
of  sturdy  men  who  trusted  to  the  mists  to  shield  them 
from  the  murderous  eyes  of  the  Claverhouses  and  their 
dragoons,  and  dotted  with  the  graves  and  the  monuments 
of  martyrs  to  a  faith — dreary  moors  "where  about  the 
graves  of  the  martyrs  the  whaups  are  crying/'  and  grey 
farmhouses  where  in  the  "killing  times"  women 
lamented  over  their  husbands  and  sons  murdered  at 
their  doors  for  loyalty  to  God  and  the  Covenant- 
surroundings,  moreover,  which  in  later  times  had  seen 
Burns  at  the  plough  dejected,  and  had  heard  him  singing 
his  songs  of  love,  of  pity,  of  gaiety,  he  went  out  a  strong 
man  in  heart  and  in  backbone,  with  the  spirit  of  great 
tradition  in  him;  nurtured  by  a  mother  who  faced  trip 

B  xvii 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

hard  world  like  a  woman  of  unconquerable  soul,  whose 
tears  were  followed  by  defiance  and  whose  sighs  ended 
with  challenge,  he  went  out  like  a  knight  arme'd  with  a 
sword  which  had  the  magic  of  conquest  tempering  its 
steel.  That  was  his  birthright,  and  that  birthright 
made  him  a  gentleman,  whether  running  errands  for  a 
baker  in  Glasgow,  or  facing  the  "overfed  beasts"  on  the 
benches  of  the  House  of  Commons.  Such  men  never 
fear  the  face  of  men  and  never  respect  their  baubles. 

From  the  same  sources  came  his  comfort  in  the 
common  folk.  All  great  human  discovery  is  the 
discovery  of  the  wisdom  that  comes  from  babes  and 
sucklings,  as  all  great  artistic  achievement  depends  on 
the  joy  that  dwells  in  the  simple.  It  has  been  said  that 
there  is  the  false  ring  of  peevishness  in  Burns'  "A  man's 
a  man  for  a*  that,"  and  it  may  be  that  resentment  gives 
a  falsetto  note  to  some  of  the  lines.  But  when  the  great 
labour  leader  comes,  whether  he  be  born  from  the 
people  or  not  will  be  of  little  concern,  the  decisive  thing 
will  be  whether  he  values  in  his  heart,  as  Burns  did, 
the  scenes  and  the  people  from  which  spring  not  only 
"Scotia's  grandeur,"  but  the  power  which  is  to  purify 
society  and  expose  the  falseness  and  the  vulgarity  of 
materialist  possession  and  class  distinctions.  The  mind 
of  the  labour  leader  must  be  too  rich  to  do  homage  to 
"tinsel  show,"  too  proud  of  its  own  lineage  to  make 
obeisance  to  false  honour,  and  too  cultured  to  be  misled 
by  vulgar  display. 

A  title,    Dempster  merits  it; 

A  gfarter  gie  to  Willie  Pitt ; 

Gie  wealth  to  some  be-ledgtr'd  cit, 

In  cent,  per]  cent. 
But  give  me  real  sterling-  wit, 

And  I'm  content. 

A  working  class  living  in  moral  and  social  parasitism 
on  its  "betters"  will  only  increase  the  barrenness  and 


xvin 


INTRODUCTION 

the  futility  of  life.  In  the  end,  it  is  perhaps  a  matter  of 
good  taste  and  self-respect,  and  these  are  birthrights 
and  are  not  taught  in  the  schools.  They  belong  to  the 
influences  which  life  assimilates  as  plants  assimilate  a 
rich  or  an  impoverished  air  and  sap.  Perhaps  the  Scots- 
man is  peculiarly  fortunate  in  this  respect.  No  country 
has  had  a  meaner  aristocracy  or  a  sturdier  common 
people.  Partly  its  education,  partly  its  history,  partly 
its  church  government  and  system  of  worship,  partly  the 
frugality  which  nature  imposed  upon  it  for  so  many 
generations,  laid  up  a  store  of  independence  in  the 
characters  of  many  of  its  people,  and  Burns  awoke  this 
into  activity.  I  doubt  if  any  man  who  received  the 
historical  birthright  of  Scotsmen  at  his  birth,  ever 
accepted  a  tinsel  honour  without  feeling  that  he  was 
doing  wrong  and  somehow  abandoning  his  country. 

Be  these  things  as  they  may,  Hardie  had  those  native 
qualities  which  never  became  incompetent  to  value  the 
honour  and  the  worth  of  a  kitchen  fireside,  of  a  woman 
who,  like  his  mother,  toiled  in  the  fields,  of  a  man  who 
earned  his  living  by  the  sweat  of  his  brow,  subduing 
Heaven  the  while.  He  said  a  life-long  Amen  to  the 
Words  which  Scott  puts  in  the  mouth  of  Rob  Roy  on 
Glasgow  bridge:  "He  that  is  without  name,  without 
friends,  without  coin,  without  country,  is  still  at  least  a 
man;  and  he  that  has  all  these  is  no  more" — Hardie  Js 
democratic  spirit  might  have  added  "and  is  often  some- 
thing less.'*  When  he  became  famous,  his  world 
widened  and  he  mixed  with  people  in  different  circum- 
stances. But  he  met  them  as  the  self-respecting 
workman,  all  unconscious  of  difference  and  with  neither 
an  attempt  nor  a  desire  to  imitate  them.  The  drawing- 
rooms  of  the  rich  never  allured  him  into  a  syco- 
phantic servitude,  a  chair  at  a  workman's  fireside 
hard  to  sit  upon  never  robbed  that  fireside  of  its 

xix 


J.  K'EIR  HARDIE 

cheery  warmth.  The  true  gentleman  is  he  who  acts 
like  a  gentleman  unconsciously.  Therefore,  this 
quality  eludes  him  who  would  write  of  it,  for  an 
explanation  of  it  suggests  consciousness  of  it.  Only 
when  the  ruling  class  habits  sought  to  impose  themselves 
on  him  by  authority  did  he  resent  them  and  become 
conscious  of  his  own  nature — as  when  he  went  to  the 
House  of  Commons  in  a  cloth  cap,  or  when,  in  an  out- 
burst of  moral  loathing,  he  replied  to  the  jeers  of  a 
band  who  had  returned  to  the  House  radiant  in 
the  garb  and  the  demeanour  of  those  who  had  risen  from 
a  well  replenished  table,  by  the  epithet  ''well-fed 
beasts/' — and  then  his  native  good  taste  speedily 
asserted  itself  and  he  became  natural. 

Experience  in  the  world  strengthened  this  part  of  his 
nature.  Whether  as  a  baker's  messenger  forced  to  pass 
moral  judgment  on  the  man  of  substantial  respecta- 
bility, or  as  a  Trade  Union  official  studying  the  results 
of  the  work  of  directors,  managers  and  such  like,  or  as 
a  politician  in  touch  with  the  political  intelligence  and 
general  capacity  of  "the  ruling  classes/'  he  saw  no 
inferiority  in  his  fellow  workmen.  He  found  them 
careless,  disorganised,  indifferent;  but  their  lives 
remained  real  and  their  common  interests  were  the  true 
interests.  They  were  the  robust  stem  upon  which 
every  desirable  thing  had  to  be  engrafted. 

Thus  it  was  that  the  sober  people,  the  people  prepared 
for  idealistic  effort,  the  people  whose  ears  detected  the 
ring  of  a  genuine  coin  and  had  become  tired  of  the 
spurious  or  ill-minted  thing,  the  people  who  were  laying 
the  foundations  of  their  new  cities  on  the  rock  of  human 
worth,  were  drawn  to  him,  honoured  him,  believed  in 
him  and  loved  him.  It  is  very  difficult  for  a  man  made 
of  that  material  to  do  justice  to  "the  classes"  in  these 
times — to  their  qualities,  their  lives,  their  interests,  and 

xx 


INTRODUCTION 

even  their  worship — but  Hardie  was  catholic,  and  rarely 
have  his  friends  heard  from  his  lips  an  unjust  con- 
demnation of  those  people.  Charity  lay  even  in  his 
most  emphatic  condemnations. 

Of  Hardie's  work  it  is  easy  to  judge  even  at  this  early 
day,  so  distinctive  was  it.  He  will  stand  out  for  ever 
as  the  Moses  who  led  the  children  of  labour  in  this 
country  out  of  bondage — out  of  bondage,  not  into 
Canaan,  for  that  is  to  be  a  longer  job.  Others  had 
described  that  bondage,  had  explained  it,  had  told  what 
ought  to  come  after  it.  Hardie  found  the  labour 
movement  on  its  industrial  side  narrowed  to  a  conflict 
with  employers,  and  totally  unaware  that  that  conflict, 
if  successful,  could  only  issue  in  a  new  economic  order; 
on  its  political  side,  he  found  it  thinking  only  of  returning 
to  Parliament  men  who  came  from  the  pits  and  work- 
shops to  do  pretty  much  the  same  work  that  the 
politicians  belonging  to  the  old  political  parties  had 
done,  and  totally  unaware  that  Labour  in  politics  must 
have  a  new  outlook,  a  new  driving  force  of  ideas  and  a 
new  standard  of  political  effort.  When  he  raised  the 
flag  of  revolt  in  Mid-Lanark,  he  was  a  rebel  proclaiming 
civil  war;  when  he  fought  the  old  Trade  Union  leaders 
from  the  floor  of  Congress,  he  was  a  sectary;  when  the 
Independent  Labour  Party  was  formed  in  Bradford,  it 
was  almost  a  forlorn  hope  attacked  by  a  section 
of  Socialists  on  the  one  hand  and  by  the  labour  leaders 
in  power  on  the  other.  What  days  of  fighting,  of 
murmuring,  of  dreary  desert  trudging  were  to  follow, 
only  those  who  went  through  them  know.  Through 
them,  a  mere  handful  of  men  and  women  sustained  the 
drudgery  and  the  buffetings.  Hardie's  dogged — even 
dour — persistence  made  faint-heartedness  impossible. 
One  has  to  think  of  some  of  those  miraculous  endurances 
of  the  men  who  defied  hardship  in  the  blank  wilderness, 

xxi 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  entangled  forest,  the  endless  snowfield,  to  get  an 
understanding  of  the  exhaustion  of  soul  and  mind  and 
body  which  had  to  be  undergone  between  1890  and  1900, 
in  order  to  create  a  Labour  Movement. 

For    this    endurance    Hardie    had    an    inexhaustible 
inner  resource.     He  knew 

The  hills  where  his  life  rose, 
And  the  sea  where  it  goes. 

He  was  one  of  the  sternest  champions  which  his  class 
has  ever  produced,  and  yet  his  was  no  class  mind.  His 
driving  and  resisting  power  was  not  hate  nor  any  of  the 
feelings  that  belong  to  that  category  of  impulse.  When 
I  used  the  expression  ''communal  consciousness,"  for 
the  first  time  in  a  book  I  had  written,  as  the  antithesis  to 
"class  consciousness,"  which  some  Socialists  regarded 
as  the  shibboleth  test  of  rectitude,  he  wrote  me  saying 
that  that  was  exactly  what  he  felt.  But  even  that  was 
not  comprehensive  enough.  His  life  of  sense  was  but 
the  manifestations  of  the  spirit,  and  to  him  "the  spirit" 
was  something  like  what  it  was  to  the  men  whose  bones 
lay  on  the  Ayrshire  moors  under  martyrs'  monuments. 
It  was  the  grand  crowned  authority  of  life,  but  an 
authority  that  spoke  from  behind  a  veil,  that  revealed 
itself  in  mysterious  things  both  to  man's  heart  and  eyes. 
He  used  to  tell  us  tales  and  confess  to  beliefs,  in  words 
that  seemed  to  fall  from  the  lips  of  a  child.  Had  he  not 
found  his  portion  where  blows  had  to  be  given  and  to  be 
fended,  and  where  the  mind  had  to  be  actively  wary 
every  moment  of  the  day  in  advancing  and  retreating, 
he  would  have  been  one  of  an  old  time  to  whom  a 
belief  in  mystic  signs  and  warnings  would  have  been 
reverence  and  not  superstition,  and  by  whom  such  signs 
would  have  been  given.  Those  who  knew  him  have 
often  met  him  looking  as  though  a  part  of  him  were 
absent  in  some  excursion  in  lands  now  barred  to  most  of 

xxii 


INTRODUCTION 

mankind.  This,  I  believe,  explains  the  hospitality  he 
always  gave  to  every  new  attempt  to  express  the  truth, 
explains  his  devotion  to  the  cause  of  women  as  it  was  in 
his  lifetime  and,  above  all,  explains  the  mysterious 
affinity  there  was  between  himself  and  children.  His 
whole  being  lay  under  the  shadow  of  the  hand  of  the 
crowned  Authority  which  told  him  of  its  presence  now 
by  a  lightning  flash,  now  by  a  whisper,  and  now  by  a 
mere  tremor  in  his  soul  like  what  the  old  folk  believed 
went  through  the  earth  when  night  died  and  the  day  was 
born.  The  world  was  life,  not  things,  to  him. 

Thus,  his  Socialism  was  not  an  economic  doctrine,  not 
a  formula  proved  and  expressed  in  algebraic  signs  of  x 
and  y.  He  got  more  Socialism  from  Burns  than  from 
Marx;  "The  Twa  Dogs,"  and  "A  Man's  a  Man  for  a' 
that,"  were  more  prolific  text  books  for  his  politics  than 
"Das  Kapital."  This  being  the  spirit  of  his  handiwork, 
the  Independent  Labour  Party,  is  one  reason  why  it 
became  the  greatest  political  influence  of  our  time  and 
threw  into  an  almost  negligible  background,  both  in  its 
enthusiastic  propaganda  and  practical  capacity,  all  other; 
Socialist  bodies  in  this  country. 

The  inconsistencies  which  are  essential  attributes  of 
human  greatness  are  the  cause  of  much  trouble  to  the 
ordinary  man,  but  these  inconsistencies  do  not  belong 
to  the  same  order  of  things  as  the  unreliabilities  of  the 
charlatan  or  the  changefulness  of  the  time-server. 
Hardie's  apparent  waywardness  often  gave  his  ccj- 
leagues  concern.  He  was  responsive  to  every  move- 
ment and  hospitable  to  the  most  childlike  thoughts — 
— so  much  so  that  in  a  battle  he  not  infrequently  seemed 
to  be  almost  in  the  opposing  ranks,  as  at  that  Derby 
Conference,  described  by  Mr.  Stewart,  when  he  sorely 
tried  the  loyalty  of  our  own  women  by  going  out  of  his 
way  to  greet  those  who  had  done  everything  in  their 

xxiii 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

power  to  harass  and  insult  them.  A  great  man  has  so 
many  sides  to  which  the  various  voices  of  the  day  make 
appeal.  He  is  not  only  one  man  but  several — not  only 
man,  but  woman  too.  But  greatness  is  inconsistent  only 
in  the  things  that  do  not  matter  very  much,  and  in  the 
grand  conflict  of  great  issues  he  stood  up  as  reliable  as 
a  mighty  boulder  in  a  torrent.  The  strength  of  hills 
was  his  for  exactly  the  same  reason  as  he  had  the  trustful 
mind  of  a  child.  What  appeared  to  be  inconsistency  was 
indeed  manysidedness.  No  man  was  more  generously 
international  in  his  outlook  and  spirit,  and  yet  to  the  very 
core  of  his  being  he  was  a  Scotsman  of  Scotsmen,  and  it  is 
not  at  all  inappropriate  that  I  came  across  him  first  of  all 
at  a  meeting  to  demand  Home  Rule  for  Scotland.  A 
man  who  held  in  no  special  esteem  the  ''book  lear"  of 
universities,  he,  nevertheless,  warmed  in  interest  to  all 
kinds  of  lore,  and  he  read  choicely  and  was  ever  ready 
to  sit  at  the  feet  of  whomsoever  had  knowledge  to  impart. 
Always  willing  to  listen,  he  was  never  ready  to  yield; 
loyal  like  a  man,  he  was,  nevertheless,  persistent  in  his 
own  way  sometimes  to  a  fault;  humble  in  the  councils  of 
friends,  he  was  proud  in  the  world.  Looking  back  at  him 
now,  the  memory  of  his  waywardness  only  adds  to 
affection  and  admiration.  One  sees  how  necessary  it 
was  for  his  work. 

There  is  one  other  inconsistency  of  greatness  which 
he  showed  only  to  friends.  He  could  stand  alone,  and 
yet  he  could  not.  "No  one  can  ever  know,"  he  once 
said  to  me,  "what  suffering  a  man  has  to  endure  by  mis- 
representation." He  required  a  corner  in  the  hearts  of 
his  people  where  he  could  rest  and  be  soothed  by  regard. 
He  therefore  felt  keenly  every  attack  that  was  crudely 
cruel.  For  instance  he  was  sorely  struck  by  the  brutally 
vile  cartoon  which  "Punch"  published  of  him  when  he 
was  in  India.  (I  knew  of  the  letters  which  Lord  Minto 

xxiv 


INTRODUCTION 

was  sending  home  expressing  pleasure  at  his  conduct 
in  India,  and  I  cheered  him  by  telling  him  of  them.) 

But  sorest  of  all  was  the  wound  which  the  war  made 
upon  him.  Like  every  intelligent  man  who  kept  his  head, 
he  saw  that  the  most  worthless  elements  in  the  country 
would  ride  the  whirlwind,  that  the  people  would  be 
worked  up  into  a  state  of  mind  that  would  not  only  defy 
every  appeal  to  reason,  but  would  prolong  the  agony 
and  settle  it,  as  all  wars  have  hitherto  been  settled,  by 
crushing  debts,  ruined  ideals  and  a  peace  which  would 
only  be  a  truce  to  give  time  for  the  sowing  of  new  seeds 
of  war.  He  knew  that  when  the  clash  came  it  could 
not  be  ended  until  the  conditions  of  a  settlement  arose, 
and  he  joined  heartily  with  the  small  group  in  the 
country  who  took  the  view  that  those  conditions  were 
political  and  not  military,  and  that,  therefore,  whilst  the 
soldier  was  holding  the  trenches,  the  politician  should  be 
as  busy  as  the  munition  worker  creating  the  political 
weapons  which  were  to  bring  peace.  He  also  knew 
that,  when  the  war  comes,  the  safety  of  every  country  is 
endangered  by  its  enemy  and  that  adequate  steps  must  be 
taken  to  protect  it.  But  he  saw  that  problem  in  its 
fulness  and  not  with  military  blinkers  limiting  his  vision 
to  recruitment,  guns  and  poison  gas.  He  was  quite 
well  aware  that  the  sky  would  speedily  be  darkened  by 
black  clouds  of  lies  and  misrepresentations,  innocent  and 
deliberate.  That  was  in  the  day's  work,  and  he  knew 
that  in  time  the  attitude  of  his  colleagues  and  himself 
would  first  of  all  be  understood  and  that,  later  on,  people 
would  wonder  why  it  took  them  so  long  to  see  the  same 
things.  He  saw  the  Treaty  of  Versailles  before  1915 
was  very  far  spent,  and  he  was  content  to  endure  and 
wait.  That  is  not  how  he  was  wounded.  The 
deadly  blow  was  given  by  the  attitude  of  old  colleagues. 
When  he  returned  from  his  first  meeting  in  his 

xxv 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

constituency  on  the  outbreak  of  war,  described  by 
Mr.  Stewart,  he  was  a  crushed  man,  and,  sitting  in  the 
sun  on  the  terrace  of  the  House  of  Commons  where  I 
came  across  him,  he  seemed  to  be  looking  out  on  blank 
desolation.  From  that  he  never  recovered.  Then 
followed  the  complete  mergence  of  the  Labour  Party 
in  the  war-lusty  crowd.  The  Independent  Labour 
Party  kept  as  trusty  as  ever,  but  he  felt  that  his  work  was 
over,  that  all  he  could  do  in  his  lifetime  was  to  amount 
to  no  more  than  picking  up  some  of  the  broken  spars  of 
the  wreckage.  As  Bunyan  puts  it,  "a  post  had  come 
from  the  celestial  city  for  him/5  And  so  he  died. 

The  outlook  has  already  changed.  The  floods  are 
subsiding  and  his  work  stands.  We  are  still  too  near 
to  that  work  to  see  it  in  its  detailed  historical  relations;  the 
day  and  its  events  are  too  pressingly  close  and  urgent  to 
enable  us  to  view  the  results  of  it  in  a  lasting  setting.  Of 
this  we  are  assured,  however  :  in  its  great  purposes  and 
general  achievements  it  is  permanent.  It  is  well  with 
him  and  his  memory. 

"I  shall  be  satisfied  when  I  awake." 

J.  RAMSAY  MACDONALD. 


xxvi 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


CHAPTER   ONE 

THE   MAKING  OF  AN  AGITATOR 

JAMES  KEIR  HARDIE  was  born  on  August 
1856,  in  a  one-roomed  house  at  Legbrannock,  near 
Holytown  in  Lanarkshire,  amongst  the  miners,  of 
whom  he  was  to  become  one,  and  with  whose  interests 
he  was  to  be  closely  identified  all  through  life. 

His  father,  David  Hardie,  was  not,  however,  a  miner, 
nor  of  miner  stock.  He  was  a  ship  carpenter  by  trade, 
drawn  into  this  district  by  the  attractions  of  Mary  Keir, 
a  domestic  servant,  who  became  his  wife  and  the  mother 
of  the  future  labour  agitator.  Both  parents  were 
endowed  with  strong  individuality  of  character,  of  a  kind 
not  calculated  to  make  life  smooth  for  themselves  or 
their  offspring;  but  it  was  undoubtedly  from  the  mother 
that  the  boy  inherited  that  resourcefulness  and  power  of 
endurance  which  enabled  him,  through  a  full  half- 
century  of  unceasing  strife,  to  develop  and,  in  some 
measure,  realise  those  ideals  of  working-class  inde- 
pendence and  organisation  with  which  his  name  is 
associated. 

Not  much  is  known  of  Keir  Hardie's  years  of  infancy, 
but  that  they  were  not  overflowing  with  joy  may  be 
surmised  from  the  fact  that  in  his  eighth  year  we  find  the 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

family — increased  in  numbers — living  in  the  ship- 
building district  of  Glasgow  in  very  straightened 
circumstances  even  for  working  folk. 

Latterly,  the  father  had  been  following  his  trade  at 
sea,  but  was  now  trying  to  settle  down  to  work  in  the 
shipyards,  not  an  easy  thing  to  do  at  a  time  when  trade 
was  dull  and  employment  scarce.  This  may  account  for 
the  fact  that  the  home  was,  now  on  the  Govan  side,  now 
on  the  Partick  side,  and  never  got  itself  really  established 
as  a  steady  going  working-class  household.  A  brief 
period  of  regular  employment  was  broken  by  an  accident 
which  incapacitated  the  breadwinner  for  many  weeks, 
during  which  there  were  no  wages  nor  income  of  any 
kind,  and  as  a  consequence  there  was  an  accruing 
burden  of  debt.  Those  were  not  the  days  of  Compensa- 
tion Acts  and  Workmen's  Insurance. 

At  this  period  we  get  our  first  real  glimpse  of  the  boy 
Keir  Hardie  and  of  the  conditions  under  which  his 
character  developed.  Hardly  had  the  father  recovered 
from  his  illness  and  started  to  work  when  a  strike  took 
place  in  the  shipbuilding  trade.  One  of  Hardie's 
earliest  recollections  was  of  attending  a  trade  union 
meeting  with  his  father  who  advised  against  the  strike  on 
the  ground  of  lack  of  funds  and  slackness  of  trade. 
During  this  dispute  the  family  were  compelled  to  sell 
most  of  their  household  goods,  and  what  was  worse,  to 
enlist  the  boy  of  seven  as  one  of  the  breadwinners.  His 
first  job  was  as  a  message  boy  to  the  Anchor  Line  Steam- 
ship Company,  and  as  school  attendance  was  now  im- 
possible, the  father  and  mother  devoted  much  of  their 
time  in  the  evenings  to  his  education,  and  were  at  least 
able  to  teach  him  to  read,  and  to  love  reading,  which  is 
the  basis  of  all  education. 

After  a  short  time  spent  as  a  message  boy,  he  was  sent 
into  a  brass-finishing  shop,  the  intention  being  to 


THE    MAKING   OF   AN   AGITATOR 

apprentice  him  to  that  trade,  but  when  it  was  learned  that 
the  first  year  must  be  without  wages,  brass  finishing  was 
abandoned,  and  his  next  place  was  in  a  lithographer's  in 
the  Trongate  at  half-a-crown  a  week.  That  did  not  last 
long  and  we  find  him  serving  as  a  baker's  message  boy 
at  three  shillings  a  week.  From  this  he  went  to  heating 
rivets  in  Thompson's  shipyard  on  a  fifty  per  cent,  rise 
in  wages,  four  shillings  and  sixpence  a  week.  He  would 
probably  have  continued  at  this  employment  and  Clyde- 
side  would  have  had  the  nurturing  of  a  great  agitator, 
but  a  fatal  accident  to  two  boys  in  the  shipyard  frightened 
the  mother,  and  once  more  he  became  a  baker's 
message  boy. 

All  this  experience  was  crowded  within  the  space  of 
two  years  and  while  he  was  still  but  a  child.  Many  other 
working-class  children  have  had  similar  experiences. 
Several  generations  of  them  in  fact,  have  been  denied  all 
knowledge  of  the  natural  joys  of  childhood  in  order  that 
the  present  industrial  system  might  be  founded  and  run. 
Whether  that  tremendous  historical  fact  finds  any 
reflection  in  the  mentality  of  the  present  day  British 
working  class  need  not  be  discussed  here,  but  it  is 
undoubted  that  these  child-time  experiences  left  an 
indelible  mark  on  the  character  of  Keir  Hardie.  It  was 
a  period  of  his  life  to  which  in  after  years  he  seldom 
referred,  but  always  with  bitterness.  The  manner  of  its 
ending  forms  the  theme  of  one  of  the  few  autobiographical 
notes  which  he  has  left  us,  and  for  that  reason,  if  for  no 
other,  his  own  description  of  it  may  be  given. 

There  had  been  a  great  lock-out  of  Clyde  shipworkers 
lasting  six  weary  months.  The  Union  funds  were  soon 
exhausted.  In  the  Hardie  household  everything  that 
could  be  turned  into  food  had  been  sold.  The  boy's 
four  shillings  and  sixpence  a  week  was  the  only  income. 
One  child,  next  in  age  to  Keir,  took  fever  and  died,  and 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

another  child  was  about  to  be  born.  "The  outlook  was 
black/'  says  Hardie,  looking  back  upon  it,  "but  there 
was  worse  to  come,  and  the  form  it  took  made  it  not  only 
a  turning  point  in  my  life,  but  also  in  my  outlook  upon 
men  and  things.  I  had  reached  an  age  at  which  I  under- 
stood the  tragedy  of  poverty,  and  had  a  sense  of  responsi- 
bility to  those  at  home  far  beyond  my  years.  I  knew  that, 
despite  the  brave  way  in  which  my  mother  was  facing 
the  situation,  she  was  feeling  the  burden  almost  too  great 
for  her  to  bear,  and  on  more  than  one  occasion  I  had 
caught  her  crying  by  herself.  One  winter  morning  I 
turned  up  late  at  the  baker's  shop  where  I  was  employed 
and  was  told  I  had  to,  go  upstairs  to  see  the  master.  I 
was  kept  waiting  outside  the  door  of  the  dining-room 
while  he  said  grace — he  was  noted  for  religious  Zeal- 
and, on  being  admitted,  found  the  master  and  his  family 
seated  round  a  large  table.  He  was  serving  out  bacon  and 
eggs  while  his  wife  was  pouring  coffee  from  a  glass  in- 
f user  which  at  once — shamefaced  and  terrified  as  I  was  - 
attracted  my  attention.  I  had  never  before  seen  such 
a  beautiful  room,  nor  such  a  table,  loaded  as  it  was  with 
food  and  beautiful  things.  The  master  read  me  a  lecture 
before  the  assembled  family  on  the  sin  of  slothfulness, 
and  added  that  though  he  would  forgive  me  for  that 
once,  if  I  sinned  again  by  being  late  I  should  be 
instantly  dismissed,  and  so  sent  me  to  begin  work. 

"But  the  injustice  of  the  thing  was  burning  hot  within 
me,  all  the  more  that  I  could  not  explain  why  I  was  late. 
The  fact  was  that  I  had  not  yet  tasted  food.  I  had  been 
up  most  of  the  night  tending  my  ailing  brother,  and  had 
risen  betimes  in  the  morning  but  had  been  made  late  by 
assisting  my  mother  in  various  ways  before  starting. 
The  work  itself  was  heavy  and  lasted  from  seven  in  the 
morning  till  closing  time. 

"Two  mornings  afterwards,  a  Friday,  I  was  again  a 


THE   MAKING   OF   AN   AGITATOR 

few  minutes  late,  from  the  same  source,  and  was  informed 
on  arriving  at  the  shop  that  I  was  discharged  and  my  fort- 
night's wages  forfeited  by  way  of  punishment.  The 
news  stupefied  me,  and  finally  I  burst  out  crying  and 
begged  the  shopwoman  to  intercede  with  the  master  for 
me.  The  morning  was  wet  and  I  had  been  drenched  in 
getting  to  the  shop  and  must  have  presented  a  pitiable 
sight  as  I  stood  at  the  counter  in  my  wet  patched  clothes. 
She  spoke  with  the  master  through  a  speaking  tube, 
presumably  to  the  breakfast  room  I  remembered  so  well, 
but  he  was  obdurate,  and  finally  she,  out  of  the  goodness 
of  her  heart,  gave  me  a  piece  of  bread  and  advised  me  to 
look  for  another  place.  For  a  time  I  wandered  about 
the  streets  in  the  rain,  ashamed  to  go  home  where  there 
was  neither  food  nor  fire,  and  actually  discussing  whether 
the  best  thing  was  not  to  go  and  throw  myself  in  the 
Clyde  and  be  done  with  a  life  that  had  so  little 
attractions.  In  the  end  I  went  to  the  shop  and  saw  the 
master  and  explained  why  I  had  been  late.  But  it  was 
all  in  vain.  The  wages  were  never  paid.  But  the 
master  continued  to  be  a  pillar  of  the  Church  and  a 
leading  light  in  the  religious  life  of  the  city !" 

A  poignant  reminiscence  for  any  human  being  to  carry 
through  life,  and  explanatory  of  the  ready  sympathy  for 
desolate  children  characteristic  of  the  man  in  after  years; 
and  also  of  his  contempt  for  that  kind  of  hypocrisy  which 
covers  up  injustice  under  the  cloak  of  religion. 

The  upshot  of  it  all  was  that  the  father  in  sheer  despair 
went  off  again  to  sea,  and  the  mother  with  her  children, 
removed  to  Newarthill,  where  her  own  mother  still  lived, 
and  quite  close  to  the  place  where  Keir  was  born. 

Thus  there  had  arrived,  as  he  himself  has  said,  a 
turning  point  in  his  life,  deciding  that  his  lot  should  be 
cast  with  that  of  the  mining  community  and  determining 
some  other  things  which,  taken  altogether,  constituted  a 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

somewhat  complex  environment  and  impulse  for  a 
receptive  minded  lad  growing  from  boyhood  to 
adolescence. 

Both  parents  had  what  is  called  in  Scotland  a  strictly 
religious  upbringing,  and  had  encouraged  the  boy  to 
attend  regularly  at  Sunday  School.  The  Glasgow 
experience  had  changed  all  that.  They  were  persons  of 
strong  individuality.  The  mother  especially  had  a 
downright  way  of  looking  at  life,  and  had  no  use  for  the 
forms  of  a  religion  which  sanctioned  the  kind  of  treat- 
ment which  she  and  those  she  loved  had  passed  through. 
Henceforward  the  Hardie  household  was  a  free-thinking 
household,  uninfluenced  by  "kirk-gaun"  conventionali- 
ties or  mere  traditional  beliefs.  Priest  and  Presbyter 
were  not  kept  outside  the  door,  but  there  was  free 
entrance  also  for  books  critical  of  orthodoxy  or  secular  in 
interest,  and  on  the  same  shelf  with  the  Bible  and  the 
Pilgrim's  Progress  might  be  found  Paine's  "Age  of 
Reason"  and  works  by  Ingersoll,  together  with  Wilson's 
"Tales  of  the  Borders' '  and  the  poems  of  Burns.  All 
the  members  of  the  family  grew  up  with  the  healthy  habit 
of  thinking  for  themselves  and  not  along  lines  prescribed 
by  custom. 

Almost  immediately  on  coming  to  Newarthill  the  boy, 
now  ten  years  of  age,  went  down  the  pit  as  trapper  to  a 
kindly  old  miner,  who  before  leaving  him  for  the  first 
time  at  his  lonely  post,  wrapped  his  jacket  round  him  to 
keep  him  warm.  The  work  of  a  trapper  was  to  open  and 
close  a  door  which  kept  the  air  supply  for  the  men  in  a 
given  direction.  It  was  an  eerie  job,  all  alone  for  ten 
long  hours,  with  the  underground  silence  only  disturbed 
by  the  sighing  and  whistling  of  the  air  as  it  sought  to 
escape  through  the  joints  of  the  door.  A  child's  mind  is 
full  of  vision  under  ordinary  surroundings,  but  with  the 
dancing  flame  of  the  lamps  giving  life  to  the  shadows, 


THE   MAKING   OF  AN   AGITATOR 

only  a  vivid  imagination  can  conceive  what  the  vision 
must  have  been  to  this  lad. 

At  this  time  he  began  to  attend  Eraser's  night  school 
at  Holy  town.  The  teacher  was  genuinely  interested  in 
his  pupils  and  did  all  he  could  for  them  with  his  limita- 
tions of  time  and  equipment.  There  was  no  light 
provided  in  the  school  and  the  pupils  had  to  bring  their 
own  candles.  Learning  had  now  a  kind  of  fascination 
for  the  boy.  He  was  very  fond  of  reading,  and  a  book, 
"The  Races  of  the  World,"  presented  to  him  by  his 
parents,  doubtless  awakened  in  his  mind  an  interest  in 
things  far  beyond  the  coal  mines  of  Lanarkshire.  His 
mother  gave  him  every  encouragement.  She  had  a 
wonderful  memory.  "Chevy  Chase' '  and  all  the  well- 
known  ballads  and  folk-lore  tales  were  recited  and 
rehearsed  round  the  winter  fire.  In  this  manner  and 
under  these  diverse  influences  did  the  future  Labour 
leader  pass  his  boyhood,  absorbing  ideas  and  impressions 
which  remained  with  him  ever  afterwards. 

The  father  returned  from  sea  and  found  work  on  the 
railway  then  being  made  between  Edinburgh  and 
Glasgow.  When  this  was  finished,  the  family  removed 
to  the  village  of  Quarter  in  the  Hamilton  district,  where 
Keir  started  as  pit  pony  driver,  passing  from  that  through 
other  grades  to  coal  hewing,  and  by  the  time  he  was 
twenty  had  become  a  skilled  practical  miner,  and  had 
also  gained  two  years'  experience  above  ground  working 
in  the  quarries. 

He  was  in  the  way  however  of  becoming  something 
more  than  a  miner.  At  the  instigation  of  his  mother  he 
had  studied  and  become  proficient  in  shorthand  writing, 
and  through  the  same  guidance  had  joined  the  Good 
Templar  movement  which  was  then  establishing  itself  in 
most  of  the  Scottish  villages.  He  became  an  enthusiastic 
propagandist  in  the  Temperance  cause,  and  it  was  in 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

tnis  sphere  that  he  really  began  to  take  a  part  in  public 
work.  His  habit  of  independent  thinking  too,  had  led 
him,  not  to  reject  religion  but  only  its  forms  and  shams 
and  doctrinal  accretions,  and  he  was  associating  himself 
with  what  seemed  to  him  the  simplest  organised 
expression  of  Christianity,  namely  the  Evangelical 
Union.  He  was,  in  fact,  like  many  another  earnest  soul 
at  his  time  of  life  seeking  outlets  for  his  spiritual  vitality. 
Because  of  the  part  he  was  now  playing  in  local  public 
affairs  his  brother  miners  pushed  him  into  the  chair  at 
meetings  for  the  ventilating  of  their  grievances,  and 
appointed  him  on  deputations  to  the  colliery  managers, 
posts  which  he  accepted,  not  without  warning  from  some 
of  his  friends  in  the  Temperance  movement  as  to  the 
dangers  of  taking  part  in  the  agitations  going  on  in  the 
district — warnings  which,  to  a  youth  of  his  temperament, 
were  more  likely  to  stimulate  forward  than  to  hold  back. 
Without  knowing  it,  almost  involuntarily,  he  had 
become  a  labour  agitator,  a  man  obnoxious  to  authority, 
and  regarded  as  dangerous  by  colliery  managers  and 
gaffers. 

The  crisis  came  for  him  one  morning  when  descending 
No.  4  Quarter  pit.  Half-way  down  the  shaft,  the  cage 
stopped  and  then  ascended.  On  reaching  the  surface 
he  was  met  by  the  stormy-faced  manager  who  told  him  to 
get  off  the  Company's  grounds  and  that  his  tools  would 
be  sent  home.  "We'll  hae  nae  damned  Hardies  in  this 
pit,"  he  said,  and  he  was  as  good  as  his  word,  for  the 
two  younger  brothers  were  also  excommunicated.  The 
Hardie  family  was  having  its  first  taste  of  the  boycott. 
Keir  now  realised  that  he  was  evidently  a  person  of  some 
importance  in  the  struggle  between  masters  and  men, 
and  a  comprehension  of  that  fact  was  perhaps  the  one 
thing  needed  to  give  settled  direction  to  his  propagandist 
energies,  hitherto  spent  somewhat  diffusely  in  move- 

8 


THE   MAKING   OF   AN   AGITATOR 

ments  which  afforded  no  opportunity  of  getting  at  close 
quarters  with  an  enemy.  By  depriving  him  of  his  means 
of  livelihood,  the  enemy  itself  had  come  to  close  quarters 
with  him.  He  had  been  labelled  an  agitator  and  he 
accepted  the  label. 

The  mining  industry  was  at  this  time  in  a  deplorable 
condition  from  the  men's  point  of  view.  The  few  years 
of  prosperity  and  comparatively  high  wages  during  the 
Franco-Prussian  War  had  been  followed  by  severe 
depression,  which,  as  usual,  pressed  more  acutely  upon 
wages  than  upon  dividends.  The  West  of  Scotland 
miners,  perhaps  through  lack  of  the  right  kind  of  leader- 
ship, had  not  taken  advantage  of  the  prosperous  years  to 
perfect  their  organisation,  and  when  the  slump  camo 
were  completely  at  the  mercy  of  the  employers.  In  the 
attempt  to  resist  reductions  the  Lanarkshire  County 
Union,  after  some  desultory  and  disastrous  strikes,  had 
collapsed.  A  chaotic  state  of  matters  existed  through- 
out Lanarkshire.  There  was  no  cohesion  or  co-ordina- 
tion, each  district  fighting  for  its  own  hand.  During  these 
black  years  the  miners  were  crushed  down  to  2s.  per  day 
in  the  Quarter  district  where  Hardie  was  now  boycotted, 
and  to  is.  8d.  and  is.  gd.  in  the  Airdrie  district. 

Here  then  was  Hardie  in  the  reawakening  of  the  need 
amongst  the  miners  to  reorganise  for  self-preservation. 
A  large-scale  strike  was  impossible.  Limitation  of  out- 
put was  the  only  alternative,  and  that  meant  a  still  further 
reduction  of  the  weekly  wage  already  at  starvation  point. 
Yet  men  and  women,  disorganised  as  they  were,  made 
the  sacrifice  all  over  Lanarkshire.  The  miners,  always 
good  fighters,  were  beginning  to  lift  their  heads  again. 
What  was  wanted  was  leadership.  By  driving  Hardie 
from  one  district  to  another  the  employers  themselves 
made  him  a  leader  of  the  men.  The  family  moved  to 
Low  Waters,  near  the  Cadzow  collieries;  and  here 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Hardie  began  to  show  that  resourcefulness  which  in 
future  years  was  to  carry  him  through  many  a  difficult 
situation.  He  opened  a  tobacconist's  and  stationer's 
shop,  while  his  mother  set  up  a  small  grocery  business. 
His  painfully  acquired  shorthand  proficiency  now  also 
came  into  play,  and  he  became  correspondent  to  the 
" Glasgow  Weekly  Mail,"  for  the  Coatbridge  and 
Airdrie  district,  thus  modestly  making  his  first  entrance 
into  the  world  of  journalism,  a  sphere  in  which  he  might 
easily  have  made  great  progress  but  for  the  insistent  call 
of  the  labour  movement.  The  appointment  at  least 
gave  him  greater  freedom  to  carry  on  his  work  among 
the  miners. 

In  the  month  of  May,  1879,  the  masters  had  intimated 
another  reduction  of  wages.  This  had  the  effect  of 
quickening  the  agitation.  Huge  meetings  were  held 
every  week  in  the  Old  Quarry  at  Hamilton,  and  at  one  of 
these  meetings  on  July  3rd,  1879,  Hardie  was  appointed 
Corresponding  Secretary.  This  gave  him  a  new  outlet 
and  enabled  him  to  get  in  touch  with  representative 
miners  all  over  Lanarkshire.  On  July  24th,  three  weeks 
after  his  appointment,  he  submitted  to  a  mass  meeting 
rules  for  the  guidance  of  the  organisation.  These  were 
adopted,  and  at  the  same  meeting  he  was  chosen  as| 
'delegate  to  attend  a  National  Conference  of  Miners  to 
be  held  in  Glasgow  the  week  following.  Speaking  at  a 
meeting  of  miners  at  Shieldmuir  in  August  of  this  year, 
he  declared  that  over-production  had  been  the  ruin  of  the 
miners,  and  said  that  he  held  in  his  hand  a  letter  from 
Alexander  Macdonald,  M.P.,  reminding  the  Lanark- 
shire miners  that  they  were  in  the  same  position  as  in 
1844  when,  by  united  action,  wages  were  raised  from  35. 
to  52.  per  day.  The  following  week,  at  a  mass  meeting, 
he  was  appointed  Miners'  Agent,  with  a  majority  of  875 
over  the  highest  vote  cast  for  other  candidates.  He  was 

10 


THE   MAKING   OF   AN   AGITATOR 

now  twenty-three  years  of  age  and  he  had  found  his 
vocation.     He  was  to  be  a  labour  agitator. 

Probably  he  himself  did  not  realise  how  uphill  and 
thorny  was  the  path  he  had  entered  upon,  nor  how  far 
it  would  lead  him.     Almost  immediately  a  curious  and 
well-nigh  unbelievable  incident  brought  home  to  him 
some  of  the  difficulties  of  his  task.-    On  September  4th, 
a  huge  demonstration  was  held  at  Low  Waters  at  which 
Alexander  Macdonald  was  the  chief  speaker.       Hardie 
moved  the  resolution  of  welcome  to  the  veteran  agitator, 
and  in  a  somewhat  rhetorical  passage,  excusable  in  an 
immature  platform  orator,  he  spoke  of  Macdonald  as  an 
"unparalleled  benefactor  of  the  mining  community," 
and  compared  his  work  for  the  miners  to  that  of  "Luther 
at  the  rise  of  Protestantism."     He  had  said  just  exactly 
the  wrong  thing  to  an  audience,  two-thirds  of  whom  were 
Irish  Roman  Catholics,  to  whom  the  name  of  Luther  was 
anathema,    and    Protestantism    more    obnoxious    than 
low  wages.     There  were  loud  murmurs  of  disapproba- 
tion,  and   Hardie  had  actually  to  be  protected  from 
assault.    How  often  has  this  tale  to  be  told  in  the  struggle 
of    labour    for    justice    and    liberty!     These    sectarian 
quarrels  have  now  partially  died  out  in  Lanarkshire,  but 
for  many  years  they  w,ere  of  the  greatest  service  to  the 
employing  class. 

At  another  National  Conference  held  at  Dunfermline, 
on  October  i6th  of  the  same  year,  Hardie  was  made 
National  Secretary,  an  appointment  which  denoted,  not 
the  existence  of  a  national  organisation,  but  the  need  for 
it.  The  Scottish  Miners'  Federation  was  not  formed  till 
some  years  later.  Hardie's  selection  at  least  indicates 
how  far  he  had  already  advanced  in  the  confidence  of  his 
fellow  workers. 

As  a  result  of  all  this  agitation,  sporadic  strikes  took 
place  early  in  1880  at  several  collieries  in  Lanarkshire, 

II 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  most  memorable  of  these  being  at  Eddlewood,  where 
there  were  conflicts  with  the  police  and  subsequent  trials 
of  pickets  for  alleged  intimidation.  In  connection  with 
this  strike  Hardie  made  his  first  visit  into  Ayrshire  to 
warn  the  miners  there  against  coming  to  Lanarkshire. 
The  hunger  of  the  women  and  children  drove  the  men 
back  to  work,  but  deepened  the  discontent,  and  in 
August,  against  the  advice  of  Hardie,  another  strike, 
general  over  the  whole  of  Lanarkshire,  took  place  and 
lasted  for  six  weeks.  How  it  was  carried  through  with- 
out Union  funds  it  is  difficult  to  imagine.  Public  sub- 
scriptions were  raised.  The  colliery  village  bands  went 
far  afield  throughout  Scotland  and  even  across  the 
border,  appealing  for  help.  No  strike  money  was  paid 
out  but  only  food  was  given.  Hardie  with  the  other 
agents  got  local  merchants  to  supply  goods,  themselves 
becoming  responsible  for  payment.  At  his  home  a  soup 
kitchen  was  kept  running,  and  all  had  a  share  of  what 
was  going  until  further  credit  became  impossible.  In 
the  end  there  was  a  sum  unpaid,  but  the  merchants,  some 
of  themselves  originally  from  the  miner  class,  did  not 
press  their  claims  too  hard  and  freed  the  agents  from  their 
bond.  The  strike  was  lost,  but  the  Union,  though 
shaken,  remained,  and  Hardie,  having  fought  his  first 
big  labour  battle,  emerged  from  what  seemed  defeat 
and  disaster,  stronger  and  more  determined  than  ever  to 
stand  by  his  class.  He  accepted  a  call  from  Ayrshire  to 
organise  the  miners  there,  and,  as  will  be  shown,  made 
good  use  of  the  experience  gained  in  Lanarkshire. 

At  this  time,  he  also  added  to  his  responsibilities  in 
another  direction.  He  became  a  married  man.  His 
agitation  activities  had  not  prevented  him  from  taking 
part  in  the  social  life  of  the  countryside,  nor  from  forming 
the  associations  which  come  naturally  to  all  healthy 
human  beings  in  the  springtime  of  life.  He  was  not 

12 


THE   MAKING   OF   AN   AGITATOR 

then,  nor  at  any  time,  the  austere  Puritanical  person  he 
has  sometimes  been  represented  to  be.  A  Puritan  he 
was  in  all  matters  of  absolute  right  or  wrong,  and  could 
not  be  made  to  budge  from  what  seemed  to  him  to  be  the 
straight  path.  But  with  that  limitation  he  was  one  of 
the  most  companionable  of  men.  He  could  sing  a  good 
song,  and  dance  and  be  merry  with  great  abandon.  He 
had  his  youthful  friendships  and  love  affairs,  more  than 
one,  culminating  as  usual,  in  a  supreme  affection  for  one 
lass  above  all  the  others;  and  so  it  came  about  that,  just 
before  migrating  into  Ayrshire,  he  was  married  to  Miss 
Lillie  Wilson,  whose  acquaintance  he  had  made  during 
his  work  in  the  Temperance  movement.  The  two  young 
folk  settled  down  in  Cumnock  to  make  a  home  for  them- 
selves, neither  of  them  probably  having  any  idea  that  in 
days  to  come  the  male  partner  would  have  to  spend  so 
much  of  his  life  outside  of  that  home,  returning  to  it 
periodically — as  a  sailor  from  his  voyaging  or  a  warrior 
from  his  campaigning — to  find  rest  and  quiet  (and  renewal 
of  strength  for  the  storms  and  battles  of  a  political  career. 

The  labour  movement  owes  much  to  its  fighting  men, 
and  to  the  women  also,  who  have  stepped  into  the  furies 
of  the  fray,  but  not  less  does  it  owe  to  the  home-keeping 
women  folk  whose  devotion  has  made  it  possible  for  the 
others  to  do  this  work.  Such  was  the  service  rendered 
by  Mrs.  Keir  Hardie  in  the  quietude  of  Old  Cumnock. 
The  home  was  at  first  an  ordinary  room  and  kitchen 
house,  and  later  a  six  roomed  cottage  and  garden  known 
to  all  members  of  the  I. L. P.  as  "Lochnorris." 

Hardie  had  come  to  Cumnock  nominally  as  the  Ayr- 
shire Miners'  Secretary,  but  there  was  really  no  Ayrshire 
Miners'  Union.  To  get  that  into  being  was  his  task. 
The  conditions  were  similar  to  those  in  Lanarkshire. 
At  most  of  the  collieries  there  were  a  few  rebel  spirits, 
keeping  the  flame  of  discontent  alive  and  ready  to  form 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

themselves  into  Union  committees  if  given  the  right 
stimulus  and  support.  It  was  from  these  the  invitation 
to  Hardie  had  come,  and  it  was  through  co-ordinating 
these  that  a  move  could  be  made  for  general  organisation. 
The  first  skirmishes  are  always  won  by  the  few  pioneers 
who  have  the  stout  hearts  and  the  burning  vision. 

It  took  nearly  a  year  to  get  the  organisation  together, 
and  by  the  beginning  of  August,  1881,  a  demand  was 
formulated,  on  behalf  of  the  whole  of  the  miners  of  Ayr- 
shire, for  a  ten  per  cent,  increase  of  wages.  The  demand 
was  refused.  There  was  no  alternative  but  to  strike  or 
go  on  working  at  the  masters'  terms.  In  the  latter  case, 
the  Union  would  be  destroyed  before  it  had  begun  to 
exist.  The  question  was,  could  the  men  all  over  the 
county  be  got  to  strike?  Would  they  risk  a  stoppage, 
knowing  that  there  could  be  no  strike  pay?  Mass 
meetings  were  summoned  in  various  parts  of  the  county 
to  be  addressed  by  Hardie  and  other  speakers  to  decide 
the  question:  "Strike  or  no  strike"?  but  the  question 
settled  itself  almost  intuitively. 

The  present  writer  has  heard  old  miners,  who  were 
young  men  then,  describe  what  happened.  It  is 
interesting  as  a  comparison  with  present  day 
methods  of  calling  a  strike.  On  the  Saturday,  at  the 
end  of  the  rows  and  on  the  quoiting  grounds,  the  talk 
was  :  " Would  there  be  a  strike?"  Nobody  knew.  On 
the  Sunday  coming  home  from  the  kirk  the  crack  was 
the  same  :  "Would  there  be  a  strike  ?"  On  Sunday 
night  they  laid  out  their  pit  clothes  as  usual,  ready 
for  work  next  morning,  but  for  ten  long  weeks  they 
had  no  use  for  pit  clothes.  On  Monday,  long  before 
dawn,  there  was  a  stir  on  the  Ayrshire  roads. 

At  two  in  the  morning  the  Annbank  brass  band  came 
playing  through  Trabboch  village  and  every  miner, 
young  and  old,  jumped  out  of  bed  and  fell  in  behind. 


THE   MAKING   OF   AN  AGITATOR 

Away  up  towards  Auchinleck  they  went  marching, 
their  numbers  increasing  with  every  mile  of  the 
road.  On  through  Darnconner,  and  Cronberry  and 
Lugar  and  Muirkirk,  right  on  to  Glenbuck  by  Aird's 
Moss  where  the  Covenanter  Martyrs  sleep,  then  down 
into  Cumnock,  at  least  five  thousand  strong.  Never  did 
magic  muster  such  an  army  of  the  morning.  It  was  as 
though  the  fairies  had  come  down  amongst  men  to 
summon  them  to  a  tryst.  Over  in  the  Kilmarnock  district 
similar  scenes  were  being  enacted.  The  bands  went 
marching  from  colliery  to  colliery  and 

"The  rising-  sun  ower   Galston  Muir, 
Wi'  glorious  light  was  glintin" 

upon  processions  of  colliers  on  all  the  roads  round  about 
Galston  village  and  Hurlford  and  Crookedholm  and 
Riccarton,  making,  as  by  one  common  impulse,  towards 
Craigie  Hill  which  had  not  witnessed  such  a  mustering 
of  determined  men  since  the  days  of  William  Wallace. 
-Ere  nightfall  a  miracle  had  been  accomplished.  For 
the  first  time  in  its  history,  there  was  a  stoppage  nearly 
complete  in  the  Ayrshire  mining  industry.  At  last  the 
Ayrshire  miners  were  united  and,  win  or  lose,  they  would 
stand  or  fall  together.  The  fields  were  ripening  to 
harvest  when  the  men  "lifted  their  graith."  Ere  they 
went  back  to  work  the  Cumnock  hills  were  white  with 
snow,  and  by  that  time  Keir  Hardie  was  at  once  the  most 
hated  and  the  best  respected  man  in  Ayrshire.  It  was 
the  Lanarkshire  experience  over  again — an  experience  of 
sacrifice  and  endurance.  The  bands  went  out  collecting 
money.  The  women  folk  and  the  children  went  "tattie 
howkin'  "  and  harvesting.  Thrifty  miners'  families  who 
had  saved  a  little  during  the  prosperous  years  of  the 
early  'seventies,  threw  their  all  into  the  common  stock. 
The  farmers,  many  of  them,  gave  meal  and  potatoes  to 
keep  the  children  from  starving.  Here  and  there  was  an 

15 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

occasional  break  away,  and  the  pickets  were  out,  and  the 
police  and  the  military,  and  there  were  skirmishes  and 
arrests  and  imprisonments.  Hardie  toiled  night  and  day 
directing-  the  relief  committees,  restraining  the  wild 
spirits  from  violence,  advocating  the  men's  claims 
temperately  and  persuasively  in  the  local  press, 
addressing  mass  meetings  all  over  the  county  and 
keeping  the  men  in  good  heart.  " God's  on  our  side, 
men,"  he  declared.  "Look  at  the  weather  He's  giein' 
us  !"  And  it  seemed  true.  It  was  the  finest  fall  of  the 
year  in  Ayrshire  within  the  memory  of  man,  and,  but  for 
the  pinch  of  hunger,  was  like  a  glimpse  of  Heaven  to  men 
accustomed  to  sweat  ten  hours  a  day  in  underground 
darkness.  Whoever  wants  to  know  why  it  is  so  easy 
to  get  the  miners  to  take  an  idle  day,  let  him  try  a  few 
hours  "howkin'  coal"  and  he  will  understand. 

So  the  fight  went  on  from  week  to  week,  till  at  last 
the  winter  came  as  the  ally  of  the  coalowners.  Boots 
and  clothes  and  food  were  needed  for  the  bairns,  and  for 
the  sake  of  the  bairns  the  men  went  back  to  work.  But 
they  went  back  as  they  came  out,  altogether,  maintaining 
their  solidarity  even  in  defeat.  Nor  were  they  wholly 
defeated.  Within  a  month  the  coalowners  discovered 
that  trade  had  improved,  and,  without  being  asked,  they 
advanced  wages,  a  thing  unprecedented  in  the  coal 
trade.  That  ten  weeks'  stoppage  had  put  a  wholesome 
fear  into  the  hearts  of  the  coalowners,  and  they  had  also 
learned  that  a  leader  of  men  had  come  into  Ayrshire. 
Here  ended  the  second  lesson  for  Keir  Hardie  the 
agitator.  In  the  impoverished  condition  of  the  miners, 
the  formation  of  the  Union  was  for  the  present  impractic- 
able, and,  recognising  this,  he  settled  himself  down 
quietly  as  a  citizen  of  Cumnock,  and  bided  his  time. 


16 


CHAPTER  TWO 

JOURNALIST  AND  LABOUR  ORGANISER "THE   MINER* ' 

IT  is  not  clear  what  Hardie's  sources  of  income 
were  in  those  early  days  in  Ayrshire.  He  had 
determined  to  work  no  more  underground  for  any 
employer.  No  colliery  manager  would  have  the  chance 
a  second  time  to  drive  him  out.  There  was  no  miners' 
organisation  to  pay  him  a  wage,  though  he  ceased  not 
from  doing  organising  work.  The  likelihood  is  that  he 
had  kept  up  his  press  connections  formed  while  in  Lan- 
arkshire, and  that  there  was  some  little  income  from  that 
quarter.  He  wrote  occasional  verses,  amateurish,  but  of 
the  kind  acceptable  in  the  "Poet's  Corner"  of  provincial 
papers,  and  there  would  be  an  odd  seven  and  sixpence  for 
these.  He  was  never  a  spendthrift,  and  probably  both  he 
and  his  lass  had  a  small  "nest  egg"  laid  by  before  they 
joined  partnership,  and  with  this  were  prepared  to  go 
on  for  a  month  or  two  until  the  man  could  make  good. 
He  had  great  faith  in  himself,  and  she  had  great  faith  in 
him,  and  what  more  could  any  newly-married  couple 
want  for  starting  out  in  life  ? 

Before  long  the  financial  question  was  solved.  The 
pastor  of  the  Evangelical  Union  church  which  Hardie 
joined  had  eked  out  a  somewhat  scanty  stipend  by  writ- 
ing notes  for  the  local  "Cumnock  News."  The  pastor, 
in  bad  health,  went  off  for  a  holiday,  and  asked  Hardie 
to  write  his  notes  while  he  was  away.  He  never 
returned,  and  Hardie  found  himself  writing  the  notes 
practically  as  a  member  of  the  staff,  and  as  he,  with  his 

m 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

knowledge  of  the  miners'  conditions  and  a  decidedly 
literary  turn  of  the  pen,  was  just  the  kind  of  man  wanted 
for  such  a  paper,  he  was,  by  and  by  to  all  intents  and 
purposes,  acting  as  editor. 

The  "Cumnock  News/'  it  should  be  said,  was  an  off- 
shoot of  the  "Ardrossan  and  Saltcoats  Herald/'  which 
then  was,  and  still  is,  one  of  the  most  ably  conducted  of 
Scottish  provincial  papers.  Its  editor  and  proprietor, 
Mr.  Arthur  Guthrie,  was  a  man  with  literary  and 
artistic  tastes,  and  in  politics  a  staunch  Liberal,  a  fact 
which,  however  we  may  regard  Liberalism  now,  was  of 
some  democratic  value  in  those  days,  in  a  shire  largely 
dominated  by  the  county  families.  It  required  some 
fortitude  to  stand  up  against  the  Bute,  the  Eglinton  and 
the  Dundonald  interests,  not  to  speak  of  the  coal-owning 
magnates  of  whom  the  Baird  family  was  the  most 
powerful. 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  Hardie's  first  editorial  experi- 
ence was  on  the  side  of  the  Liberal  Party.  There  is  no 
evidence  that  he  took  much  interest  in  politics  before  he 
came  into  Ayrshire,  but  he  could  not  help  doing  so 
now,  nor  could  any  active-minded  working  man.  The 
political  question  of  the  hour  was  the  extension  of  house- 
hold franchise  to  the  counties,  and  as  it  was  to  the 
Liberal  Party  that  the  workers  looked  for  that  boon,  it 
was  natural  that  the  earnest  and  thoughtful  sections  of 
them  should  be  Liberals.  Hardie  became  a  member  of 
the  Liberal  Association,  and,  naturally,  being  the  kind 
of  man  he  was,  was  an  active  and  prominent  member. 
He  was,  however,  a  very  complex  personality,  this  new- 
comer into  the  social  and  political  life  of  Ayrshire,  and 
neither  the  Liberal  Association  nor  the  '  Cumnock 
News  "could  absorb  more  than  a  small  part  of  his 
energies.  He  was  still  active  in  temperance  work,  and, 
as  a  matter  of  course,  became  Grand  Worthy  Chief  of 

18 


JOURNALIST 

the  local  Good  Templars'  Lodge.  He  took  his  share  of 
the  church  work  and  rilled  the  pulpit  on  occasions  when 
the  absence  of  the  appointed  minister  made  that  neces- 
sary, and  frequently  his  voice  was  to  be  heard  at  the 
street  corners  in  Cumnock  and  in  some  of  the  neigh- 
bouring villages,  preaching  the  Gospel  of  Christ  as  he 
understood  it.  He  formed  an  evening  class  two  nights 
a  week  for  the  teaching  of  shorthand  writing,  himself 
acting  as  teacher  without  fee  or  reward,  and  he  gathered 
round  him  a  group  of  students,  who,  we  may  be  sure, 
learnt  more  things  than  shorthand. 

At  this  time  his  reading  of  books  became  more  com- 
prehensive if  not  more  systematic.  That  latter  could 
hardly  be  with  his  mode  of  life.  He  then  read  Carlyle's 
'  Sartor  Resartus  '  for  the  first  time  and  became 
acquainted  with  some  of  the  writings  of  Ruskin  and  of 
Emerson.  Fiction  does  not  seem  to  have  attracted 
him  much,  except  in  the  form  of  ballads  and  folk-lore, 
though,  strange  to  say,  he  himself  wrote  one  or  two 
stones  when  later  he  had  control  of  a  paper  of  his  own. 
With  Robert  Burns  he  had  of  course  been  familiar  since 
childhood.  "  I  owe  more  to  Robert  Burns  than  to  any 
man,  alive  or  dead,"  he  once  wrote.  As  a  boy  it  was 
the  tender  humanitarianism  of  the  Scottish  peasant  poet 
to  which  his  nature  responded,  and  he  has  told  how  the 
"Lines  on  Seeing  a  wounded  Hare"  thrilled  him  with 
pity  and  anger.  He  was  gaining  in  rnqntal  power  and 
self  reliance  during  these  years,  though  with  no  settled 
purpose  as  to  the  use  he  would  make  of  the  knowledge 
and  strength  he  was  acquiring,  except  that  all  the  time 
he  had  one  fixed  immediate  object  in  view  :  the  forma- 
tion of  an  Ayrshire  Miners'  Union. 

This  event  took  place  in  August,  1886.  The  exact 
date  is  not  known  nor  the  place  of  nativity,  early  records 
having  apparently  been  lost.  James  Neil,  of  Cumnock, 

19 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

who  took  an  active  part  in  the  early  work  of  the  Union, 
has  recollections  of  a  delegate  meeting  in  Mauchline, 
at  which  Andrew  Fisher,  of  Crosshouse,  (afterwards 
Prime  Minister  of  Australia)  was  present,  and  he  thinks 
this  may  have  been  the  initial  meeting,  which  is  not 
unlikely,  Fisher,  like  Neil  himself,  being  one  of  the 
original  delegates.  Whether  that  was  so  or  not,  one 
thing  is  certain.  The  Union  was  formed  in  1886,  and 
Hardie  was  appointed  its  Organising  Secretary. 
Henceforth,  the  coal  magnates  of  Ayrshire  had  a  new 
force  to  reckon  with.  Hardie's  allowance — it  could 
hardly  be  called  a  salary — was  £75  a  year,  but  as  he 
was  earning  his  living  in  other  ways,  he  devoted  the 
money  to  the  starting  of  a  monthly  paper,  and  in  the 
beginning  of  the  following  year  produced  "The  Miner/' 
of  which  we  shall  have  something  to  say  in  due  course. 

This  same  year  the  Scottish  Miners'  Federation  was 
formed,  and  to  this  also  Hardie  was  appointed  Secre- 
tary, perhaps  on  the  principle  that  the  willing  horse  gets 
the  heaviest  burden.  That  he  was  willing  there  can  be 
no  doubt.  Since  the  days  of  the  Lanarkshire  strike, 
seven  years  before,  he  had  realised  the  need  for  the 
Scottish  miners  being  united  in  one  organisation,  and 
he  was  ready  to  take  his  share  in  the  work. 

There  was  also  being  borne  in  upon  him  and  others 
a  belief  that  the  time  had  come  for  organised  Labour 
to  consider  what  use  could  be  made  of  the  new  political 
opportunities  which  had  been  presented  to  it.  The 
passing  of  the  1884  Franchise  Act,  which  extended 
household  franchise  to  the  counties,  brought  great  hopes 
to  the  workers,  though  it  found  them,  for  the  moment, 
unable  to  take  advantage  of  it.  It  gave  political  power 
to  practically  all  the  adult  miners  in  the  country,  and  the 
leaders  of  the  miners  began  to  take  thought  as  to  how  it 
could  be  utilised. 

20 


LABOUR  ORGANISER 

For  the  most  part  they  held  to  the  belief  that  in  the 
Liberal  Party  organisation  lay  the  medium  by  which  the 
representatives  of  Labour  could  reach  Parliament. 
Liberalism,  simply  because  it  was  traditionally  opposed 
to  Toryism,  was  accepted  as  embodying  the  progressive 
spirit  of  the  nation.  The  leader  of  the  Liberal  Party  was 
W.  E.  Gladstone,  then  in  the  heyday  of  his  popularity. 
The  workers  generally  were  willing  to  trust  Gladstone, 
but  amongst  them  were  a  considerable  number  who, 
having  begun  to  imbibe  Socialist  ideas,  had  doubts 
as  to  the  genuineness  of  the  Liberal  Party's  professions 
of  goodwill  to  labour.  They  knew  that  although  it 
might  be  true  that  the  Tory  Party  was  dominated  by 
the  landed  interests,  there  were  not  a  few  territorial 
magnates  in  the  councils  of  Liberalism.  They  also 
knew  that  the  Liberal  Party  policy  was  directed  largely 
on  behoof  of  the  manufacturing  and  commercial  interests, 
and  they  felt  that,  as  in  the  very  nature  of  things  these 
interests  must  collide  with  those  of  the  workers,  to 
strengthen  the  Liberal  Party  might  be  like  making  a 
stick  for  labour's  back.  Yet,  on  the  whole,  they  were 
willing  to  give  it  a  trial,  induced  by  the  knowledge  that 
there  were  in  the  Liberal  Party  a  few  honest,  sincere 
and  able  men,  friendly  to  labour — men  such  as  Cun- 
ninghame  Graham,  the  Radical  Member  for  North- 
West  Lanark,  Conybeare,  Stephen  Mason,  Dr.  G.  B. 
Clark,  and  a  few  others,  who,  with  Burt  and  Fenwick 
and  Abraham  already  representing  the  miners,  were 
expected  to  force  the  pace  inside  the  Liberal  Party.  In 
Cunninghame  Graham  especially,  great  hopes  were  cen- 
tred. He  had  won  North-West  Lanarkshire  as  a  Glad- 
stonian  Liberal  in  the  1886  election.  In  his  election 
campaign  Graham  had  thoroughly  familiarised  himself 
with  the  needs  and  aspirations  of  the  miners,  had  whole- 
heartedly adopted  their  programme  of  reforms,  and  had 

P  21 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

advocated  the  passing  of  an  Eight  Hours'  Bill,  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  wage  court,  and  the  nationalisation  of 
minerals;  he  had,  moreover,  made  it  quite  clear  that  he 
supported  such  measures  only  as  necessary  transitional 
steps  towards  Socialism.  Two  years  later  he  was  to 
prove  his  sincerity  by  introducing  the  Miners'  Eight 
Hours'  Day  Bill  into  Parliament,  and  by  going  to  prison 
in  defence  of  free  speech.  He  had  already,  by  his 
originality  of  utterance,  caught  the  attention  of  the 
House  of  Commons,  and  the  fact  that  he  came  of  aristo- 
cratic lineage  added  piquancy  to  his  sometimes  savage 
sarcasms  against  the  ruling  classes.  Altogether,  he 
was  a  picturesque  and  dashing  Parliamentary  figure; 
and  that  this  man,  holding  views  that  were  little  short 
of  revolutionary,  should  still  be  a  recognised  member  of 
the  Liberal  Party,  helped  to  sustain  working-class  faith 
in  Liberalism  and  probably  helped  to  delay,  until  the 
psychological  moment  was  past,  the  formation  of  a  clear- 
cut,  working-class  party.  The  right  moment  was  at  the 
passing  of  the  Franchise  Act. 

Keir  Hardie,  though  himself  a  member  of  the  Liberal 
Party,  was  amongst  the  doubters,  and  he,  for  one, 
resolved  to  put  the  matter  to  the  test  at  the  earliest 
opportunity,  and  in  his  capacity  as  Secretary  of  the 
Ayrshire  Miners'  Union,  made  preparations  accordingly. 
In  May,  1887,  at  demonstrations  of  the  Ayrshire  miners 
held  on  Irvine  Moor  and  on  Cragie  Hill,  the  following 
resolution  was  adopted:  "That  in  the  opinion  of  this 
meeting,  the  time  has  come  for  the  formation  of  a  Labour 
Party  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  we  hereby  agree 
to  assist  in  returning  one  or  more  members  to  represent 
the  miners  of  Scotland  at  the  first  available  opportunity." 

Shortly  afterwards  Hardie  was  adopted  as  the  miners' 
candidate  for  North  Ayrshire,  and  immediately  there 
developed  a  situation  which  has  been  repeated  hundreds 

22 


LABOUR  ORGANISER 

of  times  since  all  over  the  country,  and  which  can  best 
be  shown  by  quotations  from  a  speech  delivered  by 
Hardie  at  Irvine  in  October  of  that  same  year.  It  is 
his  first  recorded  political  utterance,  and  defines  very 
clearly  his  attitude  at  that  stage  of  his  development.  It 
shows  that  he  was  not  yet  prepared  to  fight  on  a  full 
Socialist  programme,  and  also  that  he  was  not  unwilling 
to  work  through  the  Liberal  Party,  provided  its  methods 
were  honestly  democratic.  He  was,  in  fact,  putting 
Liberalism  to  the  test  of  allegiance  to  its  own  avowed 
principles.  He  said,  "The  Liberals  and  Conservatives 
have,  through  their  organisations,  selected  candidates. 
They  are  both,  as  far  as  I  know,  good  men.  The  point 
I  wish  to  emphasise,  however,  is  this  :  that  these  men 
have  been  selected  without  the  mass  of  the  people  being 
consulted.  Your  betters  have  chosen  the  men,  TancH 
they  now  send  them  down  to  you  to  have  them  returned. 
What  would  you  think  if  the  Miners'  Executive  Council 
were  to  meet  in  Kilmarnock  and  appoint  a  secretary  to 
the  miners  of  Ayrshire  in  that  way?  Your  candidate 
ought  to  be  selected  by  the  voice  and  vote  of  the  mass  of 
the  people.  We  are  told  that  Sir  William  Wedderburn 
is  a  good  Radical  and  that  he  is  sound  on  the  Liberal 
programme.  It  may  be  all  true,  but  we  do  not  know 
whether  it  is  or  not.  Will  he,  for  example,  support  an 
Eight  Hour  Bill?  Nobody  has  asked  him,  and  nobody 
cares  except  ourselves.  Will  he  support  the  abolition 
of  private  property  in  royalties?  Well,  he  is  a  landlord 
and  not  likely  to  be  too  extreme  in  that  respect.  Is  he 
prepared  to  establish  a  wage  court  that  would  secure  to 
the  workman  a  just  reward  for  his  labour?  Nobody 
knows  whether  he  is  or  not.  Is  he  prepared  to  support 
the  extension  of  the  Employers'  Liability  Act,  which 
presently  limits  the  compensation  for  loss  of  life,  how- 
ever culpable  the  employers  may  be,  to  three  years' 

23 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

wages?  Nobody  knows.  I  am  not  surprised  at  the 
action  of  the  Liberal  Association  in  opposing  me.  This 
is  what  has  been  done  in  nearly  every  case  where  a 
Labour  candidate  has  been  brought  forward.  I  have 
been  asked  what  course  I  intend  to  take,  and  my  reply  is, 
the  same  as  formerly.  I  will  endeavour  to  have  a  Labour 
Electoral  Association  formed  in  every  town  and  village 
in  the  constituency.  When  the  time  comes  for  an  elec- 
tion I  will  judge  how  far  circumstances  justify  me  in 
going  forward.  If  the  working  men  are  true  to  them- 
selves, I  will  insist  on  a  plebiscite  being  taken  between 
myself  and  the  Liberal  candidate,  and  then  let  the  man 
who  gets  most  support  go  to  the  poll.  If  the  Liberal 
Association  refuses  to  take  this  course,  working  men 
will  then  see  how  much  their  professions  of  friendship 
are  worth.  I  am  not  specially  anxious  to  go  to  Parlia- 
ment, but  I  am  anxious  and  determined  that  the  wants 
and  wishes  of  the  working  classes  shall  be  made  known 
and  attended  to  there.  Meantime,  I  recommend  my 
friends  not  to  pledge  themselves  to  either  of  the  candi- 
dates now  before  them  till  they  see  what  the  future 
may  bring  forth." 

There  was  nothing  revolutionary  in  all  this;  Social- 
ism was  not  even  hinted  at;  Liberalism  was  not  con- 
demned; it  was  to  be  put  upon  its  trial,  and  the  test 
of  its  sincerity  was  to  be  its  willingness  within  its  own 
organisation  to  provide  a  fair  field  for  labour.  The  one 
thing  that  does  emerge  from  this  utterance  and  others 
during  this  period  is  Hardie's  class  feeling,  inherent  in 
his  very  nature,  derived  from  and  intensified  by  his  own 
life  experience,  and  avowed  at  a  time  when  he  had  pro- 
bably made  no  acquaintance  with  Marxian  philosophy. 

"I  am  anxious  and  determined  that  the  wants  and 
wishes  of  the  working  classes  shall  be  made  known  and 
attended  to  in  Parliament."  From  that  fundamental 

24 


LABOUR  ORGANISER 

political  creed  he  never  deviated  during  the  whole  of  his 
life.  It  was  his  basic  article  of  faith,  the  impregnable 
rock  upon  which  he  stood  immovable  and  incorruptible  : 
Loyalty  to  the  working  class.  The  party  politicians 
never  could  understand  this,  and  therefore  they  never 
understood  Keir  Hardie.  The  simple  straightforward- 
ness and  steadfastness'  of  the  man  were  baffling  to  them, 
and  afterwards,  in  the  House  of  Commons,  when  he  kept 
at  arm's  length  all  Parliamentary  intriguers  and  even 
held  aloof  from  some  who  may  have  desired  from  quite 
friendly  motives  to  be  on  terms  of  social  fellowship  with 
him,  it  was  ascribed  to  boorishness  on  his  part.  It  was 
nothing  of  the  sort,  as  those  who  were  on  terms  of 
intimacy  with  him  well  knew.  It  was  the  expression  at 
once  of  his  own  individuality  and  of  his  class  loyalty. 
He  was  a  man  who  could  not  be  patronised,  and  he  was 
jealous  for  the  independence  of  the  working  people,  of 
whom  he  believed  himself  to  be  representative.  When, 
many  years  afterwards,  George  Bernard  Shaw  charac- 
terised him  as  "the  damndest  natural  aristocrat  in  the 
House  of  Commons/5  there  was  more  truth  in  the 
description  than  Shaw  himself  realised.  If  to  be  an 
aristocrat  is  to  have  pride  of  caste,  Keir  Hardie  was  an 
aristocrat.  He  possessed  pride  of  class  in  the  superla- 
tive degree,  in  a  much  greater  degree  than  the  average 
working  man  himself  has  ever  possessed  it.  Hardie 
was  willing  at  all  times  to  associate  with  members  of  the 
other  classes  for  the  furtherance  of  the  objects  he  had  in 
view — with  Fabian  middle  class  people,  with  clergy- 
men, and  artists,  and  litterateurs,  but  always  on  terms  of 
equality.  At  the*  first  hint  of  patronage,  either  on  the 
ground  of  class  or  cultural  superiority,  he  drew  back  and 
went  his  own  way,  alone  if  need  be. 

Unforeseen  events  decided  that  his  first  parliamentary 
contest  should  be  elsewhere  than  in  North  Ayrshire,  but 

25 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

it  was  here,  in  the  year  1887,  that  he  first  threw  down  his 
challenge  to  Liberalism  to  prove  its  sincerity,  and  called 
upon  his  fellow  workers  to  prepare  to  make  use  of  their 
political  opportunities  self-reliantly  and  with  a  sense  of 
the  dignity  of  their  class.  ' ' So  long  as  men  are  content  to 
believe  that  Providence  has  sent  into  the  world  one  class 
of  men  saddled  and  bridled,  and  another  class  booted 
and  spurred  to  ride  them,  so  long  will  they  be  ridden;  but 
the  moment  the  masses  come  to  feel  and  act  as  if  they 
were  men,  that  moment  the  inequality  ceases."  Thus 
he  wrote  in  "The  Miner"  at  this  time.  He  himself  had 
reached  that  stage  very  early  in  life  and  in  his  owni 
personality  he  typified  his  conception  of  what  the  working 
class  ought  to  be. 

The  year  1887  was  a  very  busy  one  for  Keir  Hardie. 
He  had  already  acquired  that  capacity  for  work  which  in 
future  years  frequently  astonished  his  colleagues  of  the 
Independent  Labour  Party.  As  already  recorded,  the 
Scottish  Miners'  Federation  had  been  formed  in  the 
autumn  of  1886  and  he  had  accepted  the  position  of 
Secretary.  A  personal  paragraph  in  the  first  Annual 
Report  gives  only  a  partial  indication  of  his  activities. 
"Conscious,"  he  says,  "of  many  defects  in  the  per- 
formance of  my  duties,  I  have  yet  tried  to  do  my  best.  It 
has  been  hard  sometimes  to  bear  the  blame  of  unreason- 
able men,  though  this  has  been  more  than  compensated 
for  by  the  tolerance  of  the  great  mass.  There  is  scarcely 
a  district  in  Scotland  where  my  voice  has  not  been  heard, 
with  what  effect  it  is  for  others  to  say.  I  find,  leaving  out 
the  deputations  to  London  and  the  big  conferences,  that 
I  have  attended  on  behalf  of  the  Federation  77  meetings, 
37  of  which  have  been  public,  and  40  Executive  and 
conference  meetings,  involving  6,000  miles  of  railway 
travelling.  I  have  sent  out  over  1,500  letters  and  circu- 
lars, and  over  60,000  printed  leaflets.  This  has  involved 

26 


LABOUR  ORGANISER 

a  very  considerable  amount  of  work,  but  I  am  persuaded 
it  has  not  been  labour  in  vain.' '  A  reference  to  the 
balance  sheet  shows  under  the  heading  of  "Salaries"  : 
"J.  K.  Hardie,  £3  155."  —a  remuneration  certainly  not 
commensurate  to  the  work  done,  but  probably  bearing 
some  proportion  to  the  earnings  of  the  miners  themselves, 
for  in  this  same  report  it  is  recorded  that  "wages  still 
continue  very  low,  ranging  from  2s.  6d.  to  45.  per  day, 
the  average  being  about  35.  3d.  Work  is,  however,  very 
unsteady,  and  thus  the  earnings  of  the  men  cannot  be 
more  than  I2s.  per  week.1'  Those  were  hard  times  for 
underground  workers,  and  not  unduly  prosperous  ones 
for  their  leaders.  Another  interesting  item  in  the  financial 
statement  runs  :  "Donation  from  meeting  in  Edinburgh 
(Socialist),  £11  8s.  6d." — probably  some  public  gather- 
ing under  the  auspices  of  the  newly-formed  Socialist 
League,  willing  thus  early  to  help  forward  the  work  of 
industrial  organisation.  The  concluding  exordium  is  in 
the  genuine  Keir  Hardie  vein  familiar  to  all  who  ever 
had  the  good  fortune  to  work  along  with  him.  * '  May  the 
experience  of  the  past  not  be  lost  on  us  in  the  future. 
There  are  a  number  of  young  and  ardent  spirits  in  our 
ranks  who,  if  they  can  be  laid  hold  of,  will  ensure  the 
success  of  our  movement  in  years  to  come.  Ours  is  no 
old-fashioned  sixpence-a-day  agitation.  We  aim  at  the 
complete  emancipation  of  the  worker  from  the  thraldom 
of  wagedom.  Co-operative  production,  under  State  \/ 
management,  should  be  our  goal,  as,  never  till  this  has 
been  obtained,  can  we  hope  for  better  times  for  working 
people."  Thus  spake  the  optimist. 

He  was  himself  prevented  from  being  present  at  this 
first  annual  meeting  of  the  Federation.  The  death  of 
his  second-born  child,  Sarah,  two  years  of  age,  had 
naturally  affected  him  very  keenly,  and  made  it  impos- 
sible for  him  at  the  time  to  be  interested  in  anything  else 

27 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

than  this  first  domestic  affliction  which  came  upon  him. 
Two  other  children  were  left,  James,  born  in  1881,  and 
Agnes,  born  in  1885,  but  as  usually  happens,  the  one  that 
was  taken  had  no  peer  in  the  minds  of  the  bereaved 
parents.  Another  boy,  Duncan,  born  this  same  year, 
1887,  helped  to  fill  the  gap  thus  made  in  the  little  family 
circle. 

The  visits  to  London  mentioned  in  the  report  were 
to  interview  the  Home  Secretary  in  favour  of  improve- 
ments in  the  Government's  Mines  Bill,  and  of 
Donald  Crawford's  Bill  to  abolish  the  truck  system, 
introduced  and  passed  during  the  Parliamentary  session 
of  that  year.  The  miners  sought  to  have  an  eight-hours 
clause  for  boys,  together  with  one  making  it  penal  for 
an  employer  to  keep  men  in  the  pit  when  they  desired  to 
get  out.  Hardie's  deputation  colleagues  were  R.  Chis- 
holm  Robertson  of  Stirlingshire,  John  Weir  of  Fife- 
shire,  and  Robert  Brown  of  the  Lothians,  all  at  that 
time  active  in  promoting  organisation  in  their  various 
districts.  They  also,  on  this  occasion,  did  some  lobby- 
ing of  Members  to  support  their  proposals,  and  in  the 
course  of  this  Keir  Hardie  doubtless  got  ample  confirma- 
tion of  the  need  for  direct  Labour  representation,  and 
was  strengthened  in  his  growing  belief  that  such  repre- 
sentation should  be  independent  of  existing  political 
parties.  We  can  also  see  the  effect  which  the  subse- 
quent result,  when  the  Eight  Hours  Amendment  was 
defeated  actually  owing  to  the  action  of  the  Liberal- 
Labour  members  from  mining  districts,  Burt,  Fenwick 
and  Abraham,  had  upon  his  attitude  to  certain  of  the 
older  Trade  Union  leaders  and  both  their  industrial  and 
political  policy. 

One  notable  amendment  of  the  Bill,  secured  very 
largely  through  pressure  by  Hardie  and  other  outside 
agitators,  was  the  prohibition  of  the  employment  of  boys 


28 


"THE   MINER" 

under  twelve.  "What  a  difference,"  he  commented  in 
"The  Miner,"  "from  the  time  when  children  were  taken 
into  the  pit  almost  as  soon  as  they  were  out  of  the  cradle. ' ' 
What  a  difference,  he  might  have  said,  from  the  time 
when  he  himself  went  down  the  pit  at  ten  years  of  age ! 
What  a  difference,  we  might  say,  from  the  present  time, 
when  fourteen  is  the  minimum  school-leaving  age. 
Verily,  the  agitators  have  not  laboured  in  vain. 

Reference  is  made  above  to  "The  Miner,"  a  monthly 
journal  of  which  he  was  the  founder  and  editor,  and  to 
which,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  he  contributed  about  one-third 
of  the  letterpress.  Its  first  number  appeared  in  January, 
1887,  and  it  was  published  for  two  years,  being  discon- 
tinued at  the  end  of  1888,  partly  because  of  the  usual 
lack  of  support  from  which  all  purely  Labour  journals 
have  suffered,  but  chiefly  because  by  that  time  Hardie 
himself  was  becoming  too  deeply  involved  in  political 
propagandist  agitation  to  be  able  to  give  the  necessary 
time  to  the  work  of  supervision.  It  was  a  very  remarkable 
paper,  and  to  those  Who  are  fortunate  enough  to  possess 
the  two  volumes,  it  mirrors  in  a  very  realistic  way  the 
social  conditions  of  the  collier  folk  of  that  time,  and  also 
throws  considerable  light  on  the  many  phases  and 
aspects  of  the  general  Labour  movement  in  the  days 
when  it  was  gropingly  feeling  its  way  through  many 
experiments  and  experiences  towards  political  self- 
reliance  and  self-knowledge. 

The  journal  is  peculiarly  valuable  to  us  in  that  it 
reveals  Hardie  himself  as  a  man  growing  and  develop- 
ing, and  becoming  more  and  more  self-assertive.  It 
began  as  "The  Miner:  a  Journal  for  Underground 
Workers."  When  it  had  reached  the  second  year  it  had 
become  "The  Miner:  an  Advanced  Political  Journal. 
Edited  by  J.  K.  Hardie,"  thus  definitely  proclaiming 
the  aim  of  its  controller — if  not  yet  of  the  workers  whose 

29 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

interests  it  advocated.  It  was  at  once  the  germ  and 
the  precursor  of  the  "Labour  Leader/'  which  was  to  be 
for  many  years  almost  the  personal  organ  of  Keir 
Hardie,  and  is  now  the  firmly  established  and  influential 
exponent  of  the  Independent  Labour  Party,  of  which  he 
was  the  founder.  In  its  pages  you  can  discern  him, 
tentatively,  but  ever  more  boldly,  finding  expression  for 
his  Socialist  convictions,  and  from  being  a  miners' 
leader,  steadily  aspiring  towards  becoming  a  people's 
leader.  He  was  quite  sure  of  himself,  and  of  his  pur- 
pose, but  not  quite  sure  of  the  approval  of  his  readers. 
"The  miners  of  Britain,"  he  said  in  his  first  leading 
article,  "stand  sorely  in  need  of  an  organ  to  ventilate 
their  grievances,  and  teach  them  the  duty  they  owe  to 
themselves.  The  paper,  while  dealing  primarily  with 
purely  mining  affairs,  will  advocate  reform  in  every 
direction  which  promises  to  bring  relief  to  the  toiling 
millions,"  and  throughout  the  career  of  the  paper  he  is 
found  giving  a  platform  to  the  pioneers  and  protagonists 
of  schemes  of  working-class  betterment,  no  matter  what 
their  label  might  be.  Land  Nationalisers,  Socialists, 
Anarchists,  Trade  Unionists,  are  all  given  room  to 
state  and  argue  their  case,  and  ever  and  anon  he  lets  it  be 
known  where  he  himself  stands  and  where  he  is  going. 
"The  capitalist  has  done  good  service  in  the  past  by 
developing  trade  and  commerce.  His  day  is  now  nearly 
past.  He  has  played  his  part  in  the  economy  of  the 
industrial  system,  and  must  now  give  way  for  a  more 
perfect  order  of  things  wherein  the  labourer  shall  be 
rewarded  in  proportion  to  his  work."  That  is  not 
exactly  Socialism,  but  the  idea  of  evolution  in  industry 
towards  Socialism  has  seldom  been  more  tersely  stated; 
nor,  indeed,  has  the  general  purpose  of  Socialism  been 
more  accurately  defined.  And  again,  "The  world  to- 
day is  sick  and  weary  at  heart.  Even  our  clergy  are  for 

30 


'THE   MINER" 

the  most  part  dumb  dogs  who  dare  not  bark.  So  it  was 
in  the  days  of  Christ.  They  who  proclaimed  a  God- 
given  gospel  to  the  world  were  the  poor  and  the  com- 
paratively unlettered.  We  need  to-day  a  return  to  the 
principles  of  that  Gospel  which,  by  proclaiming  all  men 
sons  of  God  and  brethren  one  with  another,  makes  it 
impossible  for  one,  Shylock-like,  to  insist  on  his  rights 
at  the  expense  of  another/' 

There  was  no  lack  of  idealism  in  the  journalistic  fare 
served  up  to  the  working  miners  who  turned  to  their 
trade  journal  for  news  of  the  daily  conflicts  with  em- 
ployers and  managers,  and  found  that  in  plenty,  along 
with  the  idealism.  We  have  here  the  manifestations  of 
what  I  might  call  the  spiritual  consistency  which  formed 
the  fibre  of  Hardie's  character,  and  was  in  large  measure 
the  secret  of  his  power  to  win  the  allegiance  even  of 
those  whose  belief  in  Socialism  had  a  more  materialistic 
foundation. 

His  energy  at  this  time  seems  to  have  been  inex- 
haustible. Besides  this  editorial  and  journalistic  work, 
he  was  a  member  of  Auchinleck  School  Board,  and,  in 
addition  to  his  secretarial  duties  for  the  Scottish  Miners' 
Federation,  he  was  still  acting  as  secretary  of  the 
Ayrshire  Miners'  Union,  and  in  that  capacity  displaying 
an  amount  of  vigour  surprising  to  his  associates  and 
disconcerting  to  colliery  managers  and  officials  with 
whom  he  was  perforce  in  continual  conflict.  Con- 
ducting what  are  known  as  "partial"  strikes,  bringing 
the  men  out,  now  in  one  corner  of  Ayrshire,  now  in 
another,  on  questions  of  wages,  on  questions  of  illegal 
deductions  of  weight,  on  questions  of  victimisation; 
holding  mass  meetings,  and  calling  idle  days  here,  there, 
and  everywhere,  with  a  view  to  enforcing  the  policy  of 
restriction  of  output  which  at  this  time  was  the  only 
alternative  policy  to  a  general  strike  in  resistance  to 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

wage  reductions;  and  in  one  way  and  another  keeping 
the  whole  Ayrshire  area  in  that  condition  of  unrest 
which  was  the  only  possible  means  of  giving  active 
expression  to  the  discontent  seething  throughout  the 
entire  mining  community  of  Scotland.  There  was 
indeed  very  ample  justification  for  this  agitation. 
"With  coal  selling  in  Glasgow  at  is.  per  cwt,  and 
public  works  stopped  for  want  of  fuel;  with  mounted 
policemen  riding  down  inoffensive  children  nearly  to 
death,  and  felling  quiet  old  men  with  a  blow  from  a 
baton;  with  the  wives  and  children  of  thirty  thousand 
men  not  on  the  verge  but  in  the  very  throes  of  starva- 
tion; with  all  this,  and  much  more  that  might  be  named, 
a  condition  of  things  is  being  fostered  which  can  only 
end  in  riot,  as  unhappily  has  been  in  Lanarkshire/' 
This  is  his  picture  of  the  condition  of  the  miners  at  that 
time,  a  picture  the  truth  of  which  can  easily  be  verified 
from  the  columns  of  the  contemporary  newspapers.  He 
was  in  favour  of  a  general  strike  throughout  England, 
Scotland  and  Wales,  but  the  unity  of  organisation  which 
could  bring  that  to  pass  was  yet  far  away,  and  guerilla 
fighting  was  the  only  possible  tactics.  "If  the  miners 
were  Highland  crofters/'  he  said,  "or  African  slaves, 
or  Bulgarians,  people  would  be  found  on  every 
hand  getting  up  indignation  meetings  to  protest 
against  the  wrongs  inflicted  upon  them  by  the  capit- 
alists, but  because  they  are  only  miners  nobody 
heeds  them." 

The  miners  have  now  found  means  of  making  every- 
body heed  them,  and  Hardie  and  his  colleagues  had 
already  begun  the  forging  of  the  weapons  for  that 
achievement.  It  was  on  a  motion  from  Scotland  that, 
at  a  Conference  in  Manchester  in  April,  1887,  it  was 
agreed  that  "The  Federations  be  admitted  to  the  Miners' 
National  Union  on  payment  of  one  farthing  per  member 

32 


"THE   MINER" 

quarterly,  this  money  to  be  spent  in  furthering  legislative 
work  and  in  holding  conferences  for  the  consideration  of 
the  state  of  trade  and  wages,  such  conferences  to  have 
power  to  issue  such  recommendations  as  may  seem 
necessary  for  the  improvement  of  the  same/'  Thus 
was  laid  the  basis  of  the  now  powerful  Miners'  Federa- 
tion of  Great  Britain. 

Any  account  of  this  period  of  Hardie's  life  would  be 
incomplete  without  a  reference  to  the  colliery  disaster 
at  Udston,  in  Lanarkshire,  which  took  place  on  the 
28th  May,  1887,  and  by  which  eighty-five  lives  were 
lost.  He,  immediately  on  getting  the  news,  hurried 
through  from  Ayrshire  and  joined  with  the  other  agents 
in  the  relief  work  and  in  comforting  the  bereaved 
relatives.  Many  of  the  men  who  had  been  killed  were 
his  own  personal  friends,  lads  he  had  worked  with  under- 
ground or  companioned  in  play  and  sport  and  sociality 
when  he  and  they  were  growing  into  manhood.  He  was 
able  to  visualise  the  conditions  under  which  they  had 
met  their  death  in  the  fiery  mine  with  never  a  chance  to 
escape,  and  he  believed  that  it  was  only  the  parsimony 
of  the  mineowners  that  prevented  the  methods  being 
used  which  would  make  such  accidents  impossible. 

This  belief  deepened  his  conviction  that  there  would 
never  be  proper  protection  for  the  miners  except  through 
compulsory  legislation  in  the  framing  of  which  the 
miners  themselves  should  have  a  voice.  Yet  in  after 
years  one  of  his  chief  difficulties  was  to  convince  the 
miners  themselves  of  that  fact,  and  that  they  should 
trust  only  in  themselves  for  the  passing  of  protective 
laws.  On  this  occasion,  in  "The  Miner/'  he  im- 
peached both  the  colliery  management  and  the  Govern- 
ment inspectors  for  gross  neglect  of  their  duties.  But 
of  course  "The  Miner"  was  read  only  by  miners,  and 
only  by  a  small  number  of  them. 

33 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

The  end  of  1887  brought  his  severance — voluntarily 
on  his  part — from  the  two  Ayrshire  papers,  the  "Ardros- 
san  Herald"  and  "Cumnock  News,"  with  which  he  had 
been  connected  since  1882. 

During  that  time  in  addition  to  supplying  the  news  of 
the  district,  he  had  contributed  under  the  nom  de  plume 
of  "The  Trapper,"  a  weekly  article,  headed  "Black 
Diamonds,  or  Mining  Notes  Worth  Minding."  His 
farewell  words  to  the  readers  were  indicative  alike  of  the 
character  of  his  work  on  these  local  papers  and  of  his 
aspirations  for  the  future  in  the  wider  field  upon  which 
he  was  now  entering  : — 

"I  have  tried  to  practice  what  I  preached  by  showing, 
so  far  as  I  knew  how,  that  manhood  was  preferable  to 
money.  Nor  have  I  the  least  intention  of  changing.  Cir- 
cumstances have  for  the  time  being  directed  my  course 
a  certain  way;  for  how  long  I  cannot  tell,  but  these  make 
it  all  but  impossible  for  me  to  continue  writing  'Black 
Diamonds/  ...  I  feel  like  giving  up  an  old  friend 
in  thus  taking  leave,  but  that  the  great  tide  of  human 
progress  may  keep  flowing  steadily  shoreward  till  it 
washes  away  all  the  wrong  and  the  sin  and  the  shame 
and  the  misery  which  now  exist,  is  now,  and  for  ever  will 
be,  the  sincere  prayer  of  your  friend  'The  Trapper.5 
Good  Bye." 


34 


CHAPTER  THREE 

MID-LANARK — THE    SCOTTISH  LABOUR   PARTY 

IN  the  spring  of  1888  came  the  opportunity  for  which 
he  had  been  waiting  and  preparing,  but  it  arose,  not, 
as  he  had  hoped,  in  Ayrshire,  but  in  Lanarkshire. 
The    resignation    of    Mr.    Stephen    Mason    from    the 
representation     of    Mid-Lanark    made    a    by-election 
necessary. 

The  constituency  was  pre-eminently  mining  and  there 
was  a  natural  expectation  that  the  Liberal  Party  would 
give  preference  to  a  miner  as  candidate.  Almost  as  a 
matter  of  course  Hardie's  name  was  suggested  and  a 
requisition  numerously  signed  by  electors  in  the 
Division  was  presented  to  him,  requesting  him  to  stand 
as  Labour  candidate.  In  "The  Miner"  he  made  known 
his  attitude.  "For  the  first  time,  so  far  as  Scotland  is 
concerned,  a  serious  attempt  is  to  be  made  to  run 
a  genuine  Labour  candidate  for  the  constituency,  and 
my  own  name  has  been  put  forward  in  that  connection. 
I  desire  to  define  my  position  clearly.  I  earnestly 
desire  to  see  Labour  represented  in  Parliament  by 
working  men.  Should  the  choice  of  the  electors  fall  on 
me,  I  am  prepared  to  fight  their  battle.  Should  another 
be  selected  by  them,  I  will  give  that  other  as  hearty  and 
ungrudging  support  as  one  man  can  give  another.  The 
constituency  is  essentially  one  for  returning  a  Labour 
candidate.  Much  depends  on  the  position  taken  up  by 
the  Liberal  Association.  It  may  or  may  not  select  a 
Labour  candidate.  In  either  case  my  advice  would  be 

35 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

that  the  Labour  candidate  should  be  put  forward. 
Better  split  the  party  now,  if  there  is  to  be  a  split,  than 
at  a  general  election,  and  if  the  Labour  Party  only  make 
their  power  felt  now,  terms  will  not  be  wanting  when 
the  general  election  comes." 

The  prospect  of  the  contest  aroused  widespread 
interest.  It  was  recognised  that,  not  only  the 
Liberal  professions  in  favour  of  Labour  representation, 
but  the  workers  themselves,  were  to  be  tested,  and  that, 
in  the  result,  it  would  be  shown  whether  in  a  typical 
working-class  constituency  the  workers  were  yet  ready 
to  use  their  newly-acquired  political  power  in  the 
interest  of  their  own  class  and  irrespective  of  old  party 
traditions.  The  press  immediately  got  busy.  The 
Scottish  Liberal  papers,  "The  Glasgow  Daily  Mail" 
and  the  "Scottish  Leader,"  began  to  confuse  the  issues, 
to  put  forward  the  names  of  various  middle-class 
candidates,  to  besmirch  and  misrepresent  Hardie,  and 
to  talk  about  "Tory  gold."  On  the  other  hand  the 
London  "Star"  wrote  as  follows: — "Mr.  Hardie  is 
certainly  the  best  man  for  the  constituency.  One  or 
two  of  his  stamp  are  greatly  needed  to  look  after  Scottish 
Labour  interests  in  Parliament,  especially  as  those 
interests  are  about  to  lose  the  advocacy  of  Mr.  Stephen 
Mason." 

The  Tory  "Ayrshire  Post"  said:  "Among  the 
candidates  brought  forward  for  the  expected  vacancy  in 
Mid-Lanark,  through  the  retirement  of  Mr.  Stephen 
Mason,  is  Mr.  J.  Keir  Hardie,  Cumnock.  A  corre- 
spondent interested  in  the  election  asks  us  whether  there 
is  any  truth  in  the  rumour  that  Mr.  Hardie  was  a 
Unionist  in  1886.  The  rumour  is  an  absurd  one.  Mr. 
Hardie  has  been  a  consistent  and  pronounced  Home 
Ruler  since  the  beginning  of  the  controversy.  What- 
ever faults  he  may  have,  sitting  on  the  hedge  is  not  one 

36 


MID-LANARK 

of  them.  Right  or  wrong,  you  know  what  he  means." 
So  began  the  campaign  of  lies  and  innuendo  of  which 
he  was  to  have  a  plentiful  experience  in  future  years, 
and  the  very  fact  that  the  Tory  press  was  inclined  to 
speak  of  him  respectfully  was  adduced  as  proof  that  he 
was  in  league  with  the  Tories. 

Hardie  pursued  his  way  steadily,  unmoved  by  any 
calumny.  On  the  I5th  March  he  offered  himself  as  a 
candidate  for  selection  by  the  Mid-Lanark  Liberal 
Association.  On  the  2ist  of  the  same  month  he  with- 
drew his  name  from  the  official  list  for  the  following 
reasons.  'The  Executive  of  the  Association,  without 
giving  the  electors  a  chance  of  deciding  on  the  merits 
of  the  respective  candidates,  have  already,  at  the 
instance  of  outsiders,  and  without  regard  to  fitness, 
decided  who  the  candidate  is  to  be."  The  Liberal 
candidate  finally  adopted  was  Mr.  J.  W.  Phillips,  a 
young  Welsh  lawyer,  who  ultimately  made  his  way  to 
the  House  of  Lords  as  Lord  St.  Davids.  The  Tory 
candidate  was  Mr.  W.  R.  Bousfield.  Hardie  stood 
therefore  as  an  Independent  Labour  candidate, 
the  first  of  the  kind  in  British  politics;  and  for 
that  reason,  if  for  no  other,  this  Mid-Lanark  election 
is  historical.  As  a  Labour  candidate  but,  be  it  noted, 
not  yet  as  a  Socialist,  did  he  stand.  In  his  letter  to  the 
Liberal  Association,  he  claimed  that  he  had  all  his  life 
been  a  Radical  of  a  somewhat  advanced  type,  and  from 
the  first  had  supported  Mr.  Gladstone's  Home  Rule 
proposals.  In  his  election  address  he  said,  "I  adopt  in 
its  entirety  the  Liberal  programme  agreed  to  at 
Nottingham,  which  includes  Adult  Suffrage;  Reform  of 
Registration  Laws;  Allotments  for  Labourers;  County 
Government;  London  Municipal  Government;  Free 
Education;  Disestablishment.  On  questions  of  general 
politics  I  would  vote  with  the  Liberal  Party,  to  which  I 

E  37 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

have  all  my  life  belonged."  His  proposals  for  Labour 
and  Land  legislation,  though  going  far  beyond  the 
Liberal  programme,  were  not  at  all  comprehensively 
Socialistic.  An  Eight  Hours'  Day  for  Miners,  an 
Insurance  and  Superannuation  Fund  supported  from 
Royalties,  Arbitration  Courts,  and  the  creation  of  a 
Ministry  of  Mines  were  his  mining  proposals;  the 
reimposition  of  the  four  shillings  in  the  pound  Land 
Rent,  payable  by  the  landlord  to  the  State,  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  Land  Court,  compulsory  cultivation  of 
waste  lands,  taxation  of  land  values  and  nationalisation 
of  royalties  were  his  land  programme.  On  the 
question  of  Home  Rule  he  said,  "I  will  support  the 
Irish  Party  in  winning  justice  for  Ireland,  and  in  the 
event  of  a  difference  between  them  and  the  Liberal 
Party,  would  vote  with  the  Irish' J ;  and  to  this  he  added, 
"I  am  also  strongly  in  favour  of  Home  Rule  for  Scot- 
land, being  convinced  that  until  we  have  a  Parliament 
of  our  own,  we  cannot  obtain  the  many  and  great 
reforms  on  which  I  believe  the  people  of  Scotland  have 
set  their  hearts." 

;  His  chief  appeal  however  for  differentiation  as 
between  himself  and  the  other  candidates  was  on  the 
ground  of  class  representation.  He  submitted  an 
analysis  of  all  the  interests  represented  in  Parliament, 
showing  that  out  of  the  72  members  sent  from  Scotland, 
not  one  represented  the  working  people.  "Why  is  it," 
he  asked,  "that  in  the  richest  nation  in  the  world  those 
who  produce  the  wealth  should  alone  be  poor?  What 
help  can  you  expect  from  those  who  believe  they  can 
only  be  kept  rich  in  proportion  as  you  are  kept  poor? 

'Few  save  the  poor  feel  for  the  poor,  the  rich  know  not  how 

hard, 
It  is  to  be  of  needful  food  and  needful  rest  debarred. ' 

38 


MID-LANARK 

"I  ask  you  therefore  to  return  to  Parliament  a  man  of 
yourselves,  who  being  poor,  can  feel  for  the  poor,  and 
whose  whole  interest  lies  in  the  direction  of  securing  for 
you  a  better  and  a  happier  lot?" 

Encouragement  came  from  many  quarters. 

The  recently  formed  Labour  Electoral  Association, 
which  during  this  election  assumed  the  title  of  National 
Labour  Party,  sent  through  its  treasurer,  Edward 
Harford,  £400  with  the  assurance :  "You  can  have 
more  if  needed.  . 

-This  body  subsequently  proved  itself  unable  to  stand 
the  strain  of  divided  allegiance  to  Liberalism  and 
Labour.  The  secretary,  T.  R.  Threlfall,  wrote  declaring 
the  election  to  be  "particularly  a  test  question  as  to  how 
far  the  professed  love  of  the  Liberal  Party  for  Labour 
representation  is  a  reality." 

The  Scottish  Home  Rule  Association,  both  through 
its  Edinburgh  and  its  London  Committees,  adopted  him 
as  its  candidate,  the  Metropolitan  section  passing  the 
following  resolution,  "That  this  meeting  hails  with 
gratitude  the  appearance  of  Mr.  J.  K.  Hardie,  the  tried 
and  trusted  champion  of  the  rights  of  the  Scottish 
Miners,  as  a  Labour  candidate  for  Mid-Lanark,  and 
trusts  that  the  working  men  in  that  constituency  will 
rally  round  him  and  do  themselves  the  honour  of 
returning  the  first  genuine  Labour  representative  for 
Scotland."  In  transmitting  the  resolution,  the  Sec- 
retary, J.  Ramsay  MacDonald,  sent  the  follow- 
ing letter,  the  terms  of  which  he  himself  has 
probably  long  ago  forgotten.  As  this  was  the  first 
correspondence  between  two  men  who  were  later  to  be 
in  close  comradeship,  it  is  set  down  here  for  preserva- 
tion. It  shows,  amongst  other  things,  that  Mac- 
Donald,  like  Hardie,  had  not  yet  lost  hope  in  the 
Liberal  Party. 

39 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

"Scottish  Home  Rule  Association. 
"23  Kelly  Street,  Kentish  Town,  London. 

"Mr.  J.  Keir  Hardie, 

"Dear  Mr.  Hanfie, — I  cannot  refrain  from  wishing  you 
God-speed  in  your  election  contest.  Had  I  been  able 
to  have  gone  to  Mid-Lanark  to  help  you — to  do  so  both 
by  Srord  and  deed* — would  have  given  very  great 
pleasure  indeed.  The  powers  of  darkness — Scottish 
newspapers  with  English  editors  (as  the  'Leader'), 
partisan  wire-pullers,  and  the  other  etceteras  of  political 
squabbles — are  leagued  against  us. 

"But  let  the  consequences  be  what  they  may,  do  not 
withdraw.  The  cause  of  Labour  and  of  Scottish 
Nationality  will  suffer  much  thereby.  Your  defeat  will 
awaken  Scotland,  and  your  victory  will  re-construct 
Scottish  Liberalism.  All  success  be  yours,  and  the 
National  cause  yon  champion.  There  is  no  miner — 
and  no  other  erne  for  that  matter — who  is  a  Scotsman 
and  not  ashamed  of  it,  who  will  vote  against  you  in 
favour  of  an  obscure  English  barrister,  absolutely 
ignorant  of  Scotland  and  of  Scottish  affairs,  and  who 
only  wants  to  get  to  Parliament  in  order  that  he  may 
have  the  tail  of  M.P.  to  his  name  in  the  law  courts. 

I  am,  Dear  Sir, 

Yours  very  truly, 

"J.  RAMSAY  MAcDoKALO, 

"Hon.  Secretary,  S.H.R.A." 

The  Parliamentary  Committee  of  the  Highland  Land 
League,  through  its  Chairman,  J.  Galloway  Weir,  also 
endorsed  the  candidature.  The  Glasgow  Trades 
Council  did  likewise,  and  the  Executive  Council  of  the 
British  Steel  Smelters'  Association.  Lady  Florence 
Dixie  wrote :  "If  the  miners  put  you  in  they  will  know 

40 


MID-LANARK 

that,  at  least,  they  have  a  representative  who  will  be  the 
slave  of  no  Party,  but  who  will  speak  fearlessly  for  Scot- 
land and  her  people's  interests."  Cunninghame  Graham 
sent  a  characteristic  epistle  in  which  he  expressed  the 
hope  that  all  Scotsmen  would  see  the  importance  of  not 
returning  an  Englishman,  and  concluded,  "a  good  coat 
is  useful  enough  against  the  weather,  but  why  poor  men 
should  bow  down  and  worship  one,  knowing  that  it  will 
not  warm  their  backs  passes  my  comprehension." 

Hardie  resisted  all  inducements  to  retire,  including 
an  offer  from  the  Liberal  Party,  the  nature  of  which  had 
best  be  disclosed  in  his  own  words  many  years  after- 
wards. 

"In  1888  I  came  out  as  the  Labour  candidate  for  the 
Mid-Division  of  Lanarkshire.  The  whole  story  of  that 
campaign  will  be  told  some  day — Bob  Smillie  could  tell 
it — but  for  the  moment  I  confine  myself  to  one  little 
incident.  Mr.  T.  R.  Threlfall,  Secretary  to  the  Labour 
Electoral  Association,  came  North  to  take  part  in  the 
contest.  One  evening  Threlfall  did  not  turn  up  at 
the  meeting  for  which  he  was  advertised,  and  shortly 
after  I  got  back  from  my  round  he  turned  up  at  the  hotel 
bubbling  over  with  excitement.  'I've  settled  it,'  he 
cried  excitedly.  'I've  been  in  conference  with  them  all 
the  evening,  and  it's  all  fixed  up.*  'In  conference 
with  whom,  and  settled  what?'  I  asked.  'In  con- 
ference with  the  Liberals,'  he  replied,  'at  the  George 
Hotel,  and  you've  to  retire.'  I  don't  quite  know  what 
happened  then,  but  I  remember  rising  to  my  feet  and 
Threlfall  ceased  speaking.  Next  morning  he  returned 
home  to  Southport.  On  the  day  of  his  departure 
Mr.  Schnadhorst,  the  then  chief  Caucusmonger  of  the 
Liberals,  invited  me  to  meet  him  at  the  George  Hotel. 
I  replied  that  I  was  quite  prepared  to  receive  in  writing 
anything  he  had  to  say.  The  following  day,  Mr. 

41 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

C.  A.  V.  Conybeare,  then  M.P.  for  the  Camborne 
Division  of  Cornwall,  induced  me  to  pay  a  visit  to 
Sir  George  Trevelyan,  also  at  the  George  Hotel.  Sir 
George  was  very  polite,  and  explained  the  unwisdom 
of  Liberals  and  Labour  fighing  each  other.  They 
wanted  more  working  men  in  Parliament,  and  if  only  I 
would  stand  down  in  Mid-Lanark  he  would  give  me  an 
assurance  that  at  the  General  Election  I  would  be 
adopted  somewhere,  the  party  paying  my  expenses, 
and  guaranteeing  me  a  yearly  salary — three  hundred 
pounds  was  the  sum  hinted  at — as  they  were  doing 
for  others  (he  gave  me  names).  I  explained  as  well  as 
I  could  why  his  proposal  was  offensive,  and  though 
he  was  obviously  surprised,  he  was  too  much  of  a 
gentleman  to  be  anything  but  courteous.  And  so  the 
fight  went  on." 

The  contest  was  fought  with  great  bitterness, 
especially  on  the  part  of  the  Liberals,  who  did  not 
scruple  to  introduce  sectarian  and  religious  animosities, 
and  who  were  able  to  make  great  play  with  the  Irish 
Home  Rule  question  in  a  constituency  where  the  Irish 
electorate  bulked  largely.  The  United  Irish  League 
seems  to  have  believed  implicitly  at  that  time  in  the 
willingness  and  ability  of  Mr.  Gladstone  to  carry  the 
Liberal  Party  with  him  in  establishing  Home  Rule,  and 
although  Hardie  had  the  support  of  Mr.  John  Ferguson, 
the  leading  champion  of  the  Irish  cause  in  the  West  of 
Scotland,  and  himself  on  the  Council  of  the  Liberal 
Party,  the  official  mandate  went  against  Hardie.  He 
had  thus  to  fight  both  the  Liberal  machine  and  the 
Nationalist  machine,  and  had  only  an  impromptu 
organisation  wherewith  to  counter  them.  When  the  end 
came,  he  got  617  votes,  and  the  Liberal  went  to  the 
House  of  Commons — and  in  due  course  higher  up. 
Looking  back  over  the  years  and  the  events  which 

42 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

separate  us  from  this  historical  contest,  how  tragic  is 
"the  might-have-been. " 

But  the  election  had  cleared  the  air,  and  had  settled 
one  thing  for  ever,  the  impossibility  of  a  Labour  Party 
within  the  Liberal  Party.  That  gives  it  its  permanent 
place  in  the  history  of  the  Labour  movement.  From  that 
day  onward,  the  coming  of  the  Independent  Labour 
Party  was  a  certainty,  and  that  it  should  be  a  Socialist 
Party  was  equally  certain  from  the  very  nature  of  the 
political  developments  arising  out  of  the  competitive 
commercialist  system  and  the  growing  demands  of  the 
workers  for  a  higher  standard  of  life,  which  it  was  quite 
evident  could  not  be  realised  merely  through  the  indus- 
trial organisations  then  existing. 

The  capitalist  and  the  landowning  classes  both  relied 
upon  political  force  for  the  maintenance  of  their  privi- 
leges. To  combat  these,  Labour  political  force  was 
necessary.  Only  a  minority  of  the  working  class 
leaders  were  able  to  diagnose  the  disease  and  apply  the 
remedy.  Amongst  that  minority  was  the  defeated 
Labour  candidate  for  Mid-Lanark.  Henceforth  there 
was  to  be  no  temporising  so  far  as  he  was  concerned — 
no  accommodating  other  interests.  The  issues  and  the 
policy  were  to  be  alike  clear.  A  new  chapter  in  Labour 
politics  was  opened. 

The  next  step  was  quickly  taken.  On  May  iQth, 
twenty-seven  men  met  in  Glasgow.  Mr.  John  Mur- 
doch, a  man  well  known  in  connection  with  the  High- 
land Crofters'  agitation,  sturdy  in  frame  as  in  opinions, 
presided,  and  Hardie  explained  the  object  for  which 
the  meeting  had  been  called,  viz.,  the  formation  of  a 
bona  fide  Labour  Party  for  Scotland.  A  Committee 
was  formed  to  arrange  for  a  conference  to  be  held  with- 
out delay  to  form  such  a  Party.  The  members  of  the 
Committee  were  Duncan  Macpherson,  Keir  Hardie, 

43 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Charles  Kennedy,  George  Mitchell  and  Robert 
Hutchison.  Two  of  these  at  least,  Mitchell  and 
Hutchison,  were  avowed  Socialists,  the  latter  an 
exceedingly  able  open-air  speaker,  who,  with  Bruce 
Glasier,  carried  the  Socialist  message  into  many  far 
distant  corners  of  Scotland.  These  two  were,  in  fact, 
the  voices  in  the  wilderness  heralding  the  coming  of 
the  great  army  of  propagandists  that  was  to  follow. 
Three  months  later,  on  August  25th,  the  Conference 
was  held  in  the  Waterloo  Rooms,  Glasgow,  and  the 
Scottish  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  was  duly  formed 
and  office-bearers  elected.  The  Hon.  President  was 
R.  B.  Cunninghame  Graham;  Hon.  Vice-Presidents, 
Dr.  Clark,  M.P.,  and  John  Ferguson.  The  Chair- 
man of  Executive  was  J.  Shaw  Maxwell,  who  after- 
wards became  first  secretary  of  the  national  Independent 
Labour  Party.  Keir  Hardie  was  Secretary,  and  George 
Mitchell,  Treasurer.  Thus  one  more  office  of  responsi- 
bility was  added  to  Hardie's  already  numerous  duties. 
He  was  now  Secretary  of  the  Ayrshire  Miners'  Union, 
of  the  Scottish  Miners'  Federation,  of  the  Scottish 
Parliamentary  Labour  Party,  and  editor  of  "The 
Miner."  In  the  creation  of  all  these  enterprises  on 
behalf  of  labour  his  was  the  active  mind,  and  it  cannot 
be  said  that  he  shirked  in  any  way  his  share  of  the  toil 
which  their  promotion  involved. 

Amongst  those  who  took  part  in  this  memorable  meet- 
ing was  a  delegate  from  Larkhall  named  Robert  Smillie, 
who  has  been  heard  of  in  the  world  since  then.  Hardie 
and  he  were  already  fairly  close  friends  and  fellow 
workers  in  the  common  cause,  and  remained  so  till  death 
broke  the  bond  of  comradeship.  Smillie,  though  still 
working  in  the  pits,  was,  at  the  period  of  this  meeting,  al- 
ready busy  organising  the  Lanarkshire  miners  and  serving 
them  in  a  representative  capacity  on  the  Larkhall  School 

44 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

Board.  In  such  probationary  ways  and  through  such 
manifold  experiences  do  working  class  leaders  evolve. 
This  is  the  kind  of  service  for  which  the  qualifying 
degrees  do  not  emanate  from  any  university,  though  the 
university  might  be  helpful  if  it  were  available. 

The  newly  formed  party  discussed  and  adopted  a 
lengthy  and  detailed  programme  which  need  not  be 
reproduced  here.  The  most  far-reaching  of  the  pro- 
posals, such  as  the  "State  acquisition  of  railways,  and 
all  other  means  of  transit,"  "A  National  Banking  Sys- 
tem and  the  Issue  of  State  Money  only,"  remain  yet 
unfulfilled,  though  now  well  within  the  range  of  practical 
politics.  The  formulation  of  these  demands  thirty 
years  ago  indicates  how  far  these  men  were  in  advance 
of  their  time,  and  in  what  manner  they  were  feeling 
their  way  towards  a  statement  of  Socalist  aims  which, 
by  its  very  practicality,  would  be  acceptable  to  their 
fellow  workmen.  They  were  not  dreamers  by  any 
means.  They  were  out  for  realities.  They  related  the 
hard  road  at  their  feet  with  the  justice  they  saw  on  the 
horizon. 

Following  close  upon  this  memorable  meeting  at 
Glasgow,  came  the  annual  Trades  Union  Congress  *  ./ 
held  that  year  at  Bradford.  Hardie  was  a  delegate  and 
much  in  evidence  in  the  debates,  being  practically  lead- 
ing spokesman  for  the  advanced  section,  who  made  use 
of  the  Congress  as  a  propaganda  platform  in  favour  of 
Parliamentary  Labour  Representation  and  the  Legal 
Eight  Hours'  Day.  He  also  presided  at  an  outside) 
fraternising  meeting  of  French  and  British  delegates 
for  the  purpose  of  mutual  enlightenment  on  the  progress 
of  the  working-class  movement  in  both  countries. 
Already  he  was  beginning  to  be  recognised  by  Euro- 
pean working-class  leaders  as  representative  of  the  most 
progressive  and  the  most  fearless  elements  in  the  British 

45 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Labour  movement,  and  for  his  part,  he  was  eager  to 
know  and  understand  the  conditions  under  which  they 
had  to  carry  on  the  struggle  against  the  forces  of  capital- 
ism; he  was  also,  perhaps,  desirous  of,  to  some  extent, 
taking  the  measure  of  the  personalities  who  were  in  the 
forefront  of  that  battle.  He  had  an  opportunity  of 
extending  his  knowledge  at  an  International  Confer- 
ence which  took  place  in  London  the  following  Novem- 
Ker.  This  was  Hardie's  first  International,  and  for  that 

^/reason  it  is  of  importance  for  this  memoir,  but  also  for 
other  reasons.  It  was  not  a  fully  representative  Confer- 
ence, the  German  Social  Democrats  having  decided  not 
to  take  part  through  some  misunderstanding,  which  need 
not  be  discussed  now  after  all  these  years,  but  which 
called  for  an  explanatory  circular  from  the  "Socialist 
members  of  the  German  Reichstag"  addressed  to  "Our 
Socialist  comrades,  and  the  workers  of  all  countries," 
and  including  amongst  its  signatures  the  names  of  two 
men  who  take  rank  amongst  the  great  ones  of  the 
wide-world  Socialist  movement,  William  Liebknecht 
and  August  Bebel.  The  Conference  was  called  by  the 
Parliamentary  Committee  of  the  Trades  Union  Con- 
gress, and  was  really  a  Trade  Union,  rather  than  a 
Socialist,  International.  Naturally,  the  British  dele- 
gates were  largely  in  the  majority,  being  seventy-nine 
in  number  as  compared  with  eighteen  from  France  which 
sent  the  next  largest  number.  Holland  sent  thirteen, 
Belgium  ten,  Denmark  two,  Italy  one. 

There  does  not  appear  to  have  been  any  representa- 
tion from  Austria,  or  Hungary,  or  Switzerland,  or  any  of 
the  Balkan  countries.  Hardie's  observations,  compar- 
ing the  British  with  the  foreigners  may  be  quoted,  if 
for  no  other  purpose  than  to  illustrate  his  opinions  con- 
cerning  the  British  Trade  Union  movement  of  that 

V    time.     Describing  the  reception  in  Westminster  Palace 

46 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

Hotel,  he  says:  "How  different  we  are  after  all  from 
our  neighbours.  They  are  gay,  light,  volatile,  ever 
ready  to  flare  up  into  a  passion  at  a  moment's  notice; 
we,  stolid  (stupid,  someone  called  it),  heavy,  dullish, 
slow  to  anger  (the  chairman  excepted),  and  not  at  all 
like  men  in  earnest.  Certainly  these  foreigners  know 
what  they  are  about.  They  have  made  up  their  minds 
as  to  what  they  want,  and  mean  to  have  it.  They  are 
Socialists  to  a  man,  and  have  the  fiery  zeal  which  always 
characterises  earnest  men  who  are  fighting  for  a  princi- 
ple. Probably  some  of  the  earlier  trade  unionists  of 
this  country  exhibited  the  same  characteristics,  but  now 
that  the  leader  of  a  Trade  Union  is  the  holder  of  a  fat, 
snug  office,  concerned  only  in  maintaining  the  respecta- 
bility of  the  cause,  all  is  changed.  Theirs  (the 
foreigners)  may  be  a  madness  without  method,  ours  is 
a  method  without  life.  A  fusion  of  the  two  would  be 
beneficial  all  round." 

Then  he  goes  on  to  characterise  the  notables  present 
at  the  Congress,  his  reference  to  some  of  the  home-made 
ones  being  rather  more  caustic  than  was  necessary,  but 
interesting,  nevertheless;  in  view  of  their  subsequent 
careers. 

"The  Chairman,  Mr.  George  Shipton,  of  the  London 
Trades  Council,  has  much  to  do  to  keep  things  in  order; 
next  him  Mr.  Broadhurst,  Secretary.  On  the  floor,  Mr. 
Burt,  philosophic  and  gentle-looking  as  ever,  taking  no 
part  in  the  proceedings,  but,  like  the  sailor's  parrot, 
thinking  a  lot;  Mr.  Fenwick,  too,  growing  visibly  larger, 
much  to  his  regret;  Mr.  Abraham,  5ft.  by  4ft.,  correct 
measurement,  so  that  he  is  not  so  broad  as  he  is  long, 
though  I  should  say  he  soon  will  be;  his  voice  is  scarcely 
so  clear  as  it  once  was,  but  he  himself  is  bright,  cheerful 
and  full  of  bonhomie  as  ever.  There  too,  was  Miss 
Edith  Simcox,  with  her  strong,  sympathetic  face. 

47 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

('Done  more  for  the  unskilled  workers  than  all  the  Par- 
liamentary Committee  put  together/  is  the  remark  of  one 
who  knows.)  Mrs.  Besant  attends  as  frequently  as  she 
can.  She  is  not  tall,  and  has  a  slight  stoop,  probably 
the  result  of  a  too  close  application  at  her  desk;  wears 
her  hair  short,  and  has  on  a  red  Tam-o'-Shanter;  silver 
streaks  are  not  wanting  among  her  tresses.  Miss  Chap- 
man sits  wearily  through  several  sittings,  wondering 
what  it  is  all  about.  She  is  president  of  the  Match  Girls' 
Union,  and  is  a  tall,  good-looking  lassie,  with  dark  and 
clear-cut  features,  despite  Bryant  &  May  and  their 
twenty-two  per  cent.  John  Burns  keeps  running  about 
and  appears  to  know  everybody.  He  is  an  Ayrshire 
Scotchman  of  the  third  generation.  A  thick-set,  black 
tyke  he  is,  with  a  voice  of  slightly  modulated  thunder  and 
a  nature  as  buoyant  as  a  schoolboy's.  Among  the 
foreigners  is  Anseele  of  Belgium,  probably  their  best 
man.  He  has  'done'  his  six  months  in  jail  for  siding  with 
the  workers,  but  that  has  not  daunted  him  any.  His  power 
of  speech  is  amazing,  and,  as  he  closes  his  lips  with  a  snap 
at  the  end  of  each  sentence,  he  seems  to  say,  'There  !  I 
have  spoken  and  I  mean  it.J  He  is  young,  vigorous, 
and  talented,  and  destined  to  make  his  mark.  Next  in 
importance  is  Hoppenheimer  of  Paris.  Tall  and  good- 
looking,  with  a  head  of  hair  like  a  divot.  He  has  seen 
much  life  and  is  greatly  trusted  by  his  fellows.  Christi- 
son  is  a  typical  Dane  with  a  bullet  head  and  more  given 
to  action  than  talking.  Mr.  Adolph  Smith  made  a 
capital  interpreter.  Lazzari  the  Italian  is  easily  known. 
He  wears  leather  leggings,  a  black  cloak  thrown  over 
his  shoulders  and  a  slouch  hat.  He  has  only  recently 
come  out  of  prison,  and  is  quite  prepared  to  be  sent  back 
on  his  return  home.  His  face  is  long  and  sallow;  his 
eyes  dark  and  bright,  and  as  he  stalks  about  with  a 
swinging  gait,  or  lounges  against  a  pillar  smoking  a 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

cigarette,  I  call  to  mind  the  stories  of  long  ago  in  which 
just  such  a  picture  figured  in  my  mind's  eye  as  the  cruel 
brigand.  Many  others  might  be  mentioned,  but  space 
is  limited." 

The  foregoing  appeared  in  "The  Miner,"  and  it 
justifies  the  belief  that  if  Hardie  had  not  been  so  absorbed 
in  the  cause  of  Labour,  he  might  have  been  a  prince  of 
journalists. 

Hardie  was  very  much  to  the  front  at  this  Conference, 
which  for  a  whole  day  discussed  "the  best  means  for 
removing  the  obstacles  to  free  combination  amongst  the 
workers  in  continental  countries,"  and  the  following 
morning  on  Hardie's  recommendation  carried  the  fol- 
lowing resolution  :  "The  Labour  parties  in  the  different 
countries  are  requested  to  put  on  their  programme,  and 
work  for,  by  agitation,  the  abolition  of  all  laws  pro- 
hibiting or  hampering  the  free  right  of  association 
and  combination,  national  and  international,  of  the 
workers." 

On  the  question  of  methods  he  put  forward  the  follow- 
ing proposals,  a  perusal  of  which  by  our  modern  indus- 
trial unionists  may  indicate  to  them  that  the  idea  under- 
lying their  policy  is  not  so  very  novel  after  all. 

"First.  That  all  unions  of  one  trade  in  one  country 
combine  in  electing  an  Executive  Central  body 
for  that  trade  in  that  country. 

"Second.  That  the  Central  bodies  of  the  various 
trades  in  the  different  countries  elect  a  General 
Council  for  all  trades. 

".Third.  That  the  Central  bodies  of  the  various  trades 
in  the  different  countries  shall  meet  in  Confer- 
ence annually  and  an  International  Conference 
shall  be  held  at  intervals  of  not  less  than  three 
years." 

49 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

There  was  here  the  conception  of  an  international 
industrial  power  capable  of  being  called  into  action  at 
any  given  moment  of  great  crisis,  which,  if  it  could  have 
materialised  in  the  form,  say,  of  a  general  strike,  might 
long  ago  have  completely  shattered  militarism  and  made 
impossible  the  1914  European  calamity,  while  it  would 
also  have  undermined  the  very  foundations  of  capital- 
ism. That  it  did  not  materialise  is  no  fault  of  Keir 
Hardie.  That  he  was  capable  of  formulating  it  is 
proof  of  his  greatness  of  vision,  even  if  it  implied 
a  faith  in  organised  mass  intelligence  for  which 
working-class  environment  and  tradition  gave  little 
justification.  To  have  dreamed  the  dream  was  worth 
while,  even  if  the  realisation  thereof  may  be  for 
other  generations. 

Hardie's  resolutions  were  not  carried,  but  in  their 
stead  a  long  resolution  from  the  foreigners,  to  which 
Hardie  had  no  objections  and  which,  according  to  his 
summary  of  it,  "provided  for  the  organisation  of  all 
workers,  the  appointment  of  National  Committees,  the 
formation  of  a  distinct  political  Labour  Party,  and  the 
holding,  if  possible,  of  a  yearly  International  Congress, 
the  next  one  to  meet  in  Paris  the  following  year."  The 
Conference  also  decided  in  favour  of  a  maximum  eight 
hours'  day,  and,  on  the  motion  of  Mr.  Burt,  it  resolved  : 
'That  arbitration  should  be  substituted  for  war  in  the 
settlement  of  disputes  between  nations."  Hardie's  con- 
cluding comments  are  noteworthy.  "The  Conference 
is  over.  We  know  each  other  better.  Socialism  is  in 
the  ascendant  and  everybody  knows  it.  The  marching 
order  has  been  given,  and  it  is  'Forward  !'  Henceforth 
there  can  be  no  alienation  between  British  and  Con- 
tinental workers.  The  Broadhurst  school  have  now  Hob- 
son's  choice  facing  them — accept  the  new  gospel  or  go 
down  before  those  who  will." 

50 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

Thus  ended  the  activities  of  the  year  1888  with  a 
declaration  of  Socialism.  It  had  been  a  tremendous 
year  for  Hardie.  Packed  full  of  striving  from  beginning 
to  end,  and  marking  the  beginnings  of  new  endeavours 
which  were  to  engross  him  henceforth  all  the  days  of 
his  life.  He  had  fought  his  first  parliamentary  contest. 
He  had  thrown  down  the  gauntlet  to  the  existing  political 
parties,  and  to  those  working-class  leaders  who  adhered 
to  them.  He  had  joined  hands  with  the  overseas  fighters 
for  freedom.  He  had  become  international.  He  had 
embraced  Socialism.  He  had  raised  up  against  him  in 
his  own  country  hosts  of  enemies,  but  he  had  also  secured 
troops  of  friends.  The  battle  was  drawn  and  he  took 
joy  in  it.  Let  us  have  a  square  look  at  him,  as  he 
appeared  at  this  time  to  one  who  was  fairly  closely 
associated  with  him  in  some  of  these  public  events. 
Mr.  Cunninghame  Graham,  shortly  after  Keir  Hardie's 
death,  and  for  the  purpose  of  this  memoir,  supplied  the 
following  vivid  impression  : — 

"I  first  met  Keir  Hardie  about  the  year  1887  or  1888. 
He  was  at  that  time,  in  conjunction  with  Chisholm 
Robertson,  one  of  the  chief  miners'  leaders  in  the  West 
of  Scotland.  I  first  saw  him  at  his  home  in  Cumnock. 
I  spoke  to  him  for  the  first  time  in  the  office  of  a  paper 
he  was  connected  with,  I  think  The  Miner'  or  'Cum- 
nock News.5  He  was  then  about  thirty  years  of  age, 
[  should  judge,  but  old  for  his  age.  His  hair  was  al- 
ready becoming  thin  at  the  top  of  the  head,  and  receding 
from  the  temples.  His  eyes  were  not  very  strong. 
At  first  sight  he  struck  you  as  a  remarkable  man.  There 
was  an  air  of  great  benevolence  about  him,  but  his  face 
showed  the  kind  of  appearance  of  one  who  has  worked 
hard  and  suffered,  possibly  from  inadequate  nourishment 
in  his  youth.  He  was  active  and  alert,  though  not 
athletic.  Still,  he  appeared  to  be  full  of  energy,  and 

Si 


-J.  KEIR  HARDIE  - 

as  subsequent  events  proved,  he  had  an  enormous  power 
of  resistance  against  long,  hard  an3  continual  work.    I 
should  judge  him  to  have  been  of  a  very  nervous    and 
high-strung  temperament.     At  that  time,  and  I  believe 
up  to  the  end  of  his  life,  he  was  an  almost  ceaseless 
smoker,  what  is  called  in  the  United  States    'a  chain 
smoker.'      He  was  a  very  strict  teetotaller  and  remained 
so  to  the  end,  but  he  was  not  a  bigot  on  the  subject  and 
was  tolerant  of  faults  in  the  weaker  brethren.     Nothing 
in  his  address  or  speech  showed  his  want  of  education 
in  his  youth.     His  accent  was  of  Ayrshire.     I  think  he 
took  pride  in  it  in  his  ordinary  conversation.     He  could, 
however,  to  a  great  extent  throw  this  accent  aside,  but 
not  entirely.      When  roused    or    excited    in    public    or 
private  speech  it  was  always  perceptible.    His  voice  was 
high-pitched  but  sonorous  and  very  far-carrying  at  that 
time.     He  never  used  notes  at  that  time,  and  I  think 
never  prepared  a  speech,  leaving  all  to  the  inspiration 
of   the    moment.      This   suited   his   natural,    unforced 
method  of  speaking  admirably.     He  had  all  the  charm 
and  some  of  the  defects  of  his  system.     Thus,  though 
he  rose  higher  than  I  think  it  is  possible  to  rise    when 
a  speech  is  prepared  or  committed  to  memory,  he  was 
also  subject  to  very  flat  passages  when  he  was  not,  so 
to  speak,  inspired.     His  chief  merits  as  a  speaker  were, 
in  my  opinion,  his  homeliness,  directness  and  sincerity; 
and  his  demerits  were  a  tendency  to  redundancy    and 
length,  and  a  total  lack  of  humour,  very  rare  in  an  Ayr- 
shire Scot.     This  was  to  me  curious,  as  he  had  a  con- 
siderable vein  of  pathos.    He  always  opened  his  speeches 
in  those  days  with    'Men,'    and  finished  with    'Now, 
men. J      This  habit,  which  he  also  followed  in  his  private 
speech — when  two  or  three  were  gathered    together- 
used  to  give  great  offence  to  numbers  of  paternal  capital- 
ists, baillies,  councillors,  and  other  worthy  men  who 

52 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

had  not  much  mental  culture  and  failed  to  detect 
Hardie's  sincerity,  and  took  the  familiar  'men'  as 
something  too  familiar  for  their  conversing.  Hardie's 
dress  at  this  time  was  almost  always  a  navy  blue  serge 
suit  with  a  hard  bowler  hat.  His  hair  was  never  worn 
long  and  his  beard  was  well-trimmed  and  curly.  Later 
on,  to  the  regret  of  the  'judicious,'  he  affected  a  different 
style  of  dressing  entirely  foreign  to  his  custom  when  a 
little-known  man.  He  was  then,  and  I  believe  always, 
an  extremely  abstemious  eater,  and  in  the  long  peregrin- 
ations about  the  mining  villages  of  Lanarkshire  and 
Ayrshire,  when  I  was  a  young,  unknown  M.P.  and  he 
an  equally  unknown  miners'  leader,  in  rain  and  wind, 
and  now  and  then  in  snow,  an  oatcake,  a  scone,  a  bit 
of  a  kebbuck  of  cheese  always  contented  him.  He 
would  then  sit  down  by  the  fireside  in  the  cottage  in  the 
mining  row,  and  light  up  his  corn-cob  pipe  and  talk  of 
the  future  of  the  Labour  Party,  which  in  those  days 
seemed  to  the  miners  a  mere  fairy  tale.  Now  and  then 
I  have  seen  him  take  the  baby  from  the  miner's  wife, 
and  dandle  it  on  his  knee  whilst  she  prepared  tea. 

' 'He  had  the  faculty  of  attracting  children  to  him, 
and  most  certainly  he  'forbade  them  not.'  They  would 
come  round  him  in  the  miners'  cottages  and  lean  against 
him  for  the  first  few  minutes.  One  felt  he  was  a  'family 
man'  and  so,  I  suppose,  did  the  children." 

Allowing  for  one  or  two  inaccuracies  such  as  that 
he  was  an  Ayrshire  Scot  and  "totally  lacking  in 
humour,"  the  foregoing  may  be  taken  as  a  tolerably 
faithful  pen-portrait  of  Keir  Hardie  in  his  prime,  and 
presents  characteristic  features  recognisable  by  his  later 
associates,  though  deepened  and  strengthened  by  the 
stress  of  conflict  in  the  wider  field  upon  which  he  was 
now  entering.  It  is  the  portrait  of  a  very  earnest,  sincere 
man;  resolute  and  strong,  yet  tender  and  kindly,  and 

F  53 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

making  the  most  of  his  opportunities  and  his  gifts  in  the 
interest  of  his  "ain  folk,"  the  working  class.  It  would 
be  helpful  if  some  graphic  pen  could  re-envisage  for  us 
the  wider  environment,  beyond  Lanarkshire  and  Ayr- 
shire, which  together  with  these  local  conditions  and 
these  local  struggles,  was  moulding  the  character  and 
determining  the  purpose  of  Hardie  and  many  other 
rdent  spirits  at  that  time. 

It  is  curious  to  note  how  unobservant  of  the  potential 
significance  of  these  Labour  movements  were  the  con- 
temporary publicists  and  historians.  Justin  McCarthy's 
4 'History  of  Our  Own  Times,"  for  example,  though  it 
comes  down  to  1897,  makes  only  the  most  casual  five- 
word  reference  in  recording  the  death  of  Cardinal 
Manning  to  the  London  Dock  Strike,  and  makes  no 
mention  of  the  sympathetic  strikes  all  over  the  country 
which  followed  it.  It  does  not  record  the  imprisonment 
of  Cunninghame  Graham  and  John  Burns  in  mainten- 
ance of  the  right  of  free  speech.  It  says  nothing 
about  the  "new  Unionism"  movement  which  signalised 
the  entrance  into  organised  industrialism,  and  thereby 
into  the  political  field,  of  the  great  mass  of  unskilled 
workers.  It  does  not  chronicle  the  formation  of  the 
Social  Democratic  Federation,  or  of  the  Fabian 
Society,  or  of  the  I.L.P.  It  passes  all  these  events  by 
unnoticed  as  if  they  had  nothing  whatever  to  do  with 
the  history  of  our  own  times,  and  fails  to  perceive  that 
they  were  the  beginners  of  the  new  social  and  political 
forces  which  were  bound,  in  the  very  nature  of  things, 
to  challenge  the  permanency  of  the  existing  order,  and 
become  the  source  of  whatever  has  to  be  told  in  the 
history  of  the  times  after  our  own. 

It  was  a  time  of  turmoil  and  strife,  but  also  of  hope 
for  labouring  people,  whose  most  thoughtful  representa- 
tives were  testing  and  experimenting  with  new  mediums 

54 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR   PARTY 

for  giving  expression  and  effect  to  the  aspirations  of 
their  class.  New  organisations  were  born  and  lived  a 
little  while  and  then  died,  but  always  left  behind  them 
some  foundations  and  corner  stones  for  future  builders. 
Labour  Electoral  Associations,  National  Labour 
Parties,  Sons  of  Labour — modelled  on  the  American 
Knights  of  Labour — Hardie  was  willing  to  try  them  all, 
and  also  ready  to  associate  with  the  pioneers  and  pro- 
pagandists whom  these  organisations  called  into 
activity.  Very  remarkable  personalities  some  of  them 
indeed  were,  though  not  all  with  horny  hands  or  toil- 
furrowed  faces.  Keen,  intellectual,  purposeful,  they 
carried  their  message  alike  to  the  street  corners  of  the 
great  cities  and  the  village  greens  of  remote  country 
districts.  They  brought  Socialism  into  the  market 
place.  They  elbowed  their  way  into  Radical  Associa- 
tions and  into  Tory  Clubs,  nor  disdained  the  rostrum  of 
the  Y.M.C.A.  or  the  Mutual  Improvement  Society. 
Their  purpose  was  to  break  through  the  old  habits  of 
thought,  to  undermine  stereotyped  party  formulas,  to 
prepare  the  way  for  the  new  times. 

Greatly  varied  in  origin,  in  temperament,  in  charac- 
ter, in  talents,  were  these  men  of  the  advanced  guard  of 
the  modern  British  Socialist  movement — H.  H.  Cham- 
pion, ex-army  officer,  in  appearance,  patrician  to  the 
finger  tips,  cool  as  an  iceberg,  yet  emitting  red-hot 
revolution  in  the  placid  accents  of  clubland;  Tom 
Mann,  a  working  engineer,  fresh  from  the  <ctanner-an- 
hour"  dock  strike,  with  all  its  honours  full  upon  him, 
vigorous,  eloquent,  strong-lunged,  rich-toned,  speaking 
as  easily  in  an  amphitheatre  as  Champion  could  do  in 
a  drawing  room,  the  very  embodiment,  it  seemed,  of  the 
common  people ;  Bruce  Glasier,  a  designer  and  architect, 
somewhat  angular  in  physical  outline,  pale  of  face, 
yet  withal  picturesquely  attractive  at  a  street  corner  with 

55 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  breeze  dishevelling  his  hair  and  carrying  his  high- 
pitched,  musical  tones  to  the  far  end  of  the  street,  his 
artistic  fusing  of  poetry,  economics    and  politics  com- 
pelling even  the  Philistines  to  stand  and  listen;  James 
Connolly,   a   labourer   from  the   Edinburgh   Cleansing 
Department  a  most  un-Celtic-like  personality,  slow  and 
difficult  of  utterance,  yet  undeterred  by  any  disability 
either  of  physique  or  training  from  delivering  his  mes- 
sage, a  very  encyclopaedia  of  statistical  facts  and  figures 
and  of  Marxian  economics,  a  victimised  industrial  martyr 
even  then,  but  with  nothing  either  in  his  demeanour  or  in 
his  political  views  foreshadowing  his  tragic  and  heroic  end 
at  the  head  of  an  Irish  rebellion.    And  with  these  some- 
times, and  sometimes  alone,  there  was  a  burly,  thick-set 
figure  of  a  man,  in  blue    sailor-like  garb,  yet    withal 
countrified     in     appearance,      a     ruddy-complexioned 
lion-headed     man,      William      Morris,     poet,     artist, 
pre-Raphaelite — and    because    he    was    all    these    and 
humanitarian  to  boot,  a  Socialist.      There  were  others 
too,  rough  and  uncultured,  or  refined  and  bookish,  men 
from  the  mine  and  from  the  factory,  and  the  workshops 
and  the  dockyard  and  the  smelting  furnace,    working 
men  with  active  brains  and  great  hearts,  artists,  dons, 
professional  men.     Harry  Quelch,  Pete  Curran,  Bob 
Hutcheson,  Sandy  Haddow,  Bob  Smillie    and    many 
others  like  unto  them  crowded  into  this  service.     These 
were  the  men  who,  with  Keir  Hardie,  were    making 
Socialism  in  the  'eighties  of  the  last  century.     He  was 
with  them  but  not  yet  entirely  of  them.    He  was  at  close 
grips  with  that  form  of  capitalism  under  whose  domin- 
ation his  lot  had  been  cast.   Fighting  the  coalowners  and 
stiffening    the    men,    smoking   his    pipe  in  the  colliery 
rows  and  fondling  the  bairns,  yet  all  the  time,  assimilat- 
ing inspiration  from  the  turmoil  beyond,  and  gradually 
merging  himself  in  that    turmoil.       Idealist    and    en- 

56 


SCOTTISH  LABOUR  PARTY 

thusiast,  yet  looking  ever  to  the  practical  side  of  things 
and  retaining  always  his  own  individuality.  The  friend- 
less, forlorn  errand  boy  of  Glasgow  streets  has  come 
far  in  these  twenty-two  years.  He  has  still  much  farther 
to  go  in  the  new  world  of  service  that  is  opening  out 
ahead  of  him. 


57 


CHAPTER  FOUR 

THE    SECOND    INTERNATIONAL — WEST    HAM — THE    I.L.P. — 
THE  HOUSE  OF  COMMONS 

THE  year  1889  is  notable  in  Socialist  history 
as  the  year  in  which  what  is  known  as  the 
Second  International  was  founded.  Its  pre- 
decessor, formed  in1  1864,  under  the  style  of  the 
International  Workingmen's  Association  by  Karl  Marx 
in  co-operation  with  George  Odger,  George  Howell, 
Robert  Applegarth,  and  other  leading  British  trade 
unionists,  together  with  representatives  from  the 
Continental  countries,  was  rent  asunder  by  disputes 
between  Bakuninists  and  Marxists,  and  finally  ceased  to 
exist  in  1876.  But  the  principles  and  the  purpose  which 
inspired  it  could  not,  and  cannot,  be  destroyed.  Inter- 
national war,  the  Franco-Prussian,  had,  for  the  time 
being,  defeated  international  working-class  solidarity, 
as  it  has  once  again — may  we  hope  for  the  last  time- 
in  these  recent  terrible  years.  The  idea  of  co-ordinated 
international  class  effort  based  upon  communion  of 
interests  is  one  of  those  ideas  which,  once  enunciated, 
are  indestructible  except  through  the  disappearance  of 
class.  The  slogan  of  the  Communist  Manifesto, 
"Workers  of  the  world  unite/'  sounded  by  Marx  twenty 
years  before  the  first  International  was  formed,  may  be 
temporarily  overwhelmed  by  militarist  and  nationalist 
war  cries,  but  it  re-asserts  itself,  and  must  do  so  until 
it  becomes  the  ascendant,  dominant  note  in  humanity's 
marching  tune. 

58 


THE    SECOND    INTERNATIONAL 

The  call  for  international  working-class  unity  was 
making  itself  heard  once  more,  and  this  1889  Confer- 
ence in  Paris  was  the  answer  to  the  call.  Naturally, 
Keir  Hardie  was  there  amongst  the  others.  There  were, 
in  fact,  two  Congresses  held  simultaneously,  one  of 
purely  trade  union  origin,  arising  out  of  the  decisions 
of  the  Conference  held  in  London  the  previous  year,  and 
the  other  arising  out  of  the  decisions  of  the  -German 
Working-Class  Party  in  1886.  But  for  misunder- 
standings, unavoidable  perhaps  in  the  early  stages  of 
so  great  a  thing  as  an  international  movement,  there 
need  only  have  been  one  Congress,  for  both  passed 
the  same  resolutions  and  manifested  the  same 
purpose,  though  one  was  labelled  Possibilist,  and 
the  other  Marxist. 

What  is  to  be  noted  is,  that  Hardie  attended  the 
avowedly  Marxist  Congress,  thus  early  affirming  his 
allegiance  to  the  Socialist  conception  of  internation- 
alism. Hyndman,  the  exponent  and  standard  bearer  in 
Britain  of  Marxian  philosophy  pure  and  undefiled, 
attended  the  Possibilist  gathering  as  delegate  from  the 
Social  Democratic  Federation.  With  him  were  repre- 
sentatives from  the  Fabian  Society,  the  Trades  Union 
Congress  and  the  Trade  Union  movement  generally, 
amongst  his  colleagues  being  John  Burns,  Herbert  Bur- 
rows, Mrs.  Besant,  Thomas  Burt,  M.P.,  and  Charles 
Fenwick,  M.P.  Hardie,  who  at  the  other  Congress 
represented  the  Scottish  Labour  Party,  had  for  com- 
panions Cunninghame  Graham  from  the  same  Party, 
and  William  Morris  from  the  Socialist  League.  Thus, 
before  any  political  Labour  Party  had  been  formed  for 
Great  Britain,  a  Scottish  Labour  Party  was  represented 
in  the  international  movement,  due  undoubtedly  to  the 
influence  of  its  Secretary,  Keir  Hardie.  At  this  Con- 
gress he  found  himself  in  the  company  of  many  famous 

59 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

leaders  from  other  lands,  including  Wilhelm  Lieb- 
knecht,  Jules  Guesde,  Bebel,  Vollmar,  Dr.  Adler  and 
Anseele,  and,  W£  may  be  sure,  gained  education  and 
inspiration  thereby.  Both  Congresses  passed  resolu- 
tions in  favour  of  an  Eight  Hours'  Day,  a  Minimum 
Wage,  prohibition  of  child  labour  and  unhealthy 
occupations,  and  the  abolition  of  standing  armies; 
not  by  any  means  a  revolutionary  programme,  but  one 
postulating  the  demands  upon  which  the  organised 
workers  of  all  countries  might  be  expected  to  agree. 
The  virtue  and  strength  of  the  International  was  not  in 
its  programme,  but  in  the  mere  fact  of  its  existence. 
Therein  lay  incalculable  potentialities.  The  Workers' 
International  is  the  adaptation  of  labour  force  to  meet 
the  world  conditions  created  by  modern  capitalism. 
It  challenges,  not  any  particular  form  of  government 
here  or  there,  in  this  country  or  in  that,  but  the 
capitalist  system,  which  is  one  and  the  same  in  all 
countries. 

Moreover,  the  International  differentiated  itself 
from  other  rebel  movements  in  that  it  placed  no  reliance 
on  underground  methods.  It  came  out  into  the  open. 
It  assumed  that  labour  was  now  strong  enough  to  stand 
upright.  It  recognised  that  methods  of  secrecy  made 
national  working-class  co-operation  impossible,  and  that 
only  by  open  declaration  of  ideals  and  purposes  could  the 
people  in  the  various  countries  understand  and  have 
confidence  in  each  other.  The  International  was,  and 
is,  an  historic  phenomenon,  vastly  more  important  than 
the  English  Magna  Charta,  the  American  Declaration 
of  Independence,  or  the  Fall  of  the  Bastille.  It  is  the 
summation  of  these  and  other  efforts  towards  liberty, 
seeking  not  merely  to  proclaim,  but  to  establish  the 
Rights  of  Man.  Three  times  it  has  suffered  eclipse. 
The  Communist  League  hardly  survived  its  birth-hour 

60 


THE    SECOND    INTERNATIONAL 

amid  the  storms  and  revolutionary  turmoil  of  1848.  The 
First  International — so-called — went  down  through  the 
blood  and  fire  of  the  Franco-Prussian  War.  The 
Second,  of  which  we  are  now  speaking,  was  submerged 
in  the  frenzies  of  a  world  war.  Already  it  emerges 
once  again,  the  deathless  International,  and  who  shall 
say  that  it  will  not  this  time  accomplish  its  purpose? 

They  were  strong,  courageous  spirits  who  conceived 
the  Workers'  International  and  gave  it  form  and  stimu- 
lus, and  lifted  it  ever  and  anon  out  of  the  very  jaws 
of  death.  Amongst  these  Keir  Hardie  has  a  foremost 
place. 

The  consciousness  of  having  assisted  in  an  event  of 
unparalleled  importance  to  the  working  class  could  not 
but  have  an  expanding  effect  upon  a  mind  already  deeply 
impressed  with  a  sense  of  the  greatness  of  the  Labour 
movement,  and  it  is  unfortunate  that  we  have  no  per- 
sonal record  of  his  impressions  at  this  time.  He  was 
not  much  in  the  habit  of  revealing  his  thoughts  in  his 
private  correspondence,  and  his  paper,  "The  Miner," 
having  ceased  to  exist,  we  have  no  printed  account  of 
the  Paris  Congress  such  as  that  which  he  gave  of  the 
London  one  the  previous  year.  It  would  have  been 
deeply  interesting  for  us  to  know,  not  only  his  thoughts 
about  the  personalities  whom  he  met,  but  also  how  the 
great  city  of  Paris  looked  to  the  miner  from  Ayrshire. 
That  this  experience  constituted  another  s,tage  in  the 
development  of  his  character  cannot  be  doubted,  and  the 
equanimity  with  which  in  future  years  he  was  able  to  meet 
the  rebuffs,  vexations  and  scurrilities  which  assailed 
him  in  the  course  of  his  work  for  Socialism,  derived  itself 
in  large  measure  from  his  sense  of  the  magnitude  of  the 
cause  to  which  his  life  was  now  consecrated. 

At  home,  the  chief  task  of  Hardie  and  other  advanced 
workers  was  to  combat  the  conservative  elements  in  the 

61 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Labour  movement  itself,  as  exemplified  in  the  reluctance 
of  the  big  Trade  Unions  to  adapt  themselves  to  the 
changing  economic  and  political  conditions  of  the  time. 
After  a  long  heroic  struggle  the  old  repressive  combin- 
ation laws  had  broken  down.  Trade  Unionism  had  been 
legalised,  an  achievement  in  itself  marking  a  big  step  in 
the  advance  towards  liberty,  but  still  only  a  step.  The  right 
to  combine,  implying  the  right  to  strike,  was  still  for  large 
sections  of  the  workers  only  a  right  theoretically,  as  was 
shown  by  the  failure  of  Joseph  Arch  to  organise  the  agri- 
cultural labourers,  and  by  the  difficuty  of  incorporating  in 
the  general  Trade  Union  movement  the  immense  mass  of 
unskilled  labour,  male  and  female,  whose  low  standard 
of  wages  continually  imperilled  the  higher  standard  of 
the  organised  sections.  This  very  year  another  big 
strike  of  London  Dock  labourers  had  taken  place,  and 
there  was  seen  amongst  this  class  of  workers  much  the 
same  sequence  of  events  which  Hardie  had  witnessed 
amongst  the  miners  of  Lanarkshire  and  Ayrshire,  namely, 
that  the  strike  was  a  necessary  prelude  to  the  Trade 
Union.  First  organise  and  then  strike,  seems  logical, 
but  in  the  early  stages  of  revolt  against  economic  sub- 
jection, necessity,  not  logic,  is  the  determining  factor, 
and  the  process  is  first  strike  then  organise.  The  strike, 
resorted  to  in  many  cases  in  sheer  desperation  by 
unorganised  workers  who  have  been  driven  to  the  con- 
clusion that  it  is  better  to  go  idle  and  starve  than  to 
work  and  starve,  emphasises  (whether  it  be  partially 
successful  or  a  complete  failure)  the  need  for  organisa- 
tion, and  later  there  comes  the  conviction  that  if  only 
the  organisation  can  be  made  effective  enough  there  will 
be  no  need  for  strikes.  uThe  strike  epidemic,"  as  the 
pressmen  called  it,  of  those  years,  amongst  dockers,  gas- 
workers,  general  labourers,  seamen,  match  girls  and 
other  seemingly  helpless  sections  of  the  community,  laid 

62 


THE    SECOND    INTERNATIONAL 

the  foundations  for  the  powerful  unions  of  the  unskilled 
— so  called — which  now  play  an  equally  effective  part 
with  the  craftsmen's  associations  in  determining  con- 
ditions of  employment.  But  in  its  immediate  economic 
effects  the  strike  movement  of  those  times  did  something 
more  than  that.  It  demonstrated  the  inter-dependence 
of  all  sections  of  labour,  and  consequently  the  mutuality 
of  the  interests  of  all.  A  stoppage  of  labour  in  the  dock- 
yards, or  on  the  railways,  or  in  the  coal  mines  throughout 
the  country,  affected  the  productive  capacity  of  engineers 
and  textile  workers  and  the  distributive  capacity  of  shop- 
keepers and  warehousemen.  It  played  havoc  with  the 
idea  of  an  aristocracy  of  labour.  It  tended  to  break 
down  class  divisions  within  the  working  class.  It  gave 
birth  to  the  idea  that  the  Labour  cause  is  one  and 
indivisible. 

Synchronising  with  all  this  industrial  unrest  was  the 
fact  that  the  workers  now  possessed  a  large  measure  of 
political  power,  and  the  growing  feeling  that  some 
means  must  be  found  of  giving  effect  to  it.  In  all  their, 
disputes,  the  workers  found  the  Government,  whether 
Tory  or  Liberal,  throwing  its  weight  on  the  side  of  the 
employers.  They  found  that  in  these  disputes  they  had 
to  fight  both  Tory  and  Liberal  employers,  that  directors 
and  shareholders  of  industrial  companies  knew  no  party 
politics;  they  even  found,  as  in  the  casie  of  the  strike 
of  the  shamefully  underpaid  women  at  the  Manningham 
Mills  in  Yorkshire,  a  Liberal  Cabinet  Minister  amongst 
the  sweaters.  They  found  further,  that  Parliament, 
though  elected  by  the  votes  of  the  workers,  made  not 
the  slightest  attempt  to  deal  with  the  problem  of 
unemployment,  but  left  the  employers  free  to  use 
that  problem  with  its  surplusage  of  labour  as  a 
weapon  against  the  workers;  and  thus  there  began 
to  evolve,  almost  without  propaganda,  a  belief  in 

63 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  need  for  a  political  Labour  Party — an  Independent 
Labour  Party. 

Towards  .the  formation  of  such  a  party  Hardie  now 
devoted  all  his  activities.  Not  only  on  the  propaganda 
platform  and  in  the  Miners'  Trade  Union  Councils,  but 
year  by  year  at  the  annual  Trades  Union  Congress  he 
had  come  to  be  regarded  as  the  chief  spokesman  of  the 
new  idea  of  political  independence,  and  was  the  mark 
for  all  the  antagonism  which  that  idea  evoked,  not  only 
from  the  capitalists  and  landlords,  but  from  the  working 
classes  themselves,  and  especially  from  those  working- 
class  leaders  who,  while  believing  in  political  action, 
had  all  their  lives  and  with  perfect  sincerity  been  looking 
towards  Liberalism  as  the  way  out.  These  men 
naturally  resented  any  action  which  tended  to  weaken 
the  Liberal  Party  as  being  either  treason  or  stupidity. 
Passions  were  aroused  and  some  life-long  friendships 
broken  during  this  protracted  struggle  between  the 
right  and  left  wings  of  the  Labour  movement.  But 
the  work  went  on,  and  when  the  General  Election  of 
1892  came  along,  sufficient  progress  had  been  made  to 
justify  the  Independents  in  at  least  a  partial  and  tenta- 
tive trial  of  strength  at  the  polls,  as  the  outcome  of 
which  Keir  Hardie  found  himself  in  Parliament. 

That  fact  gives  some  measure  alike  of  the  growth  of 
the  labour  sentiment  towards  political  independence, 
and  of  the  extent  to  which  Hardie  was  now  recognised 
as  representative  not  merely  of  a  trade  or  section  or 
district,  but  of  the  Labour  movement  nationally. 

In  1888,  he  had  claimed  the  suffrages  of  the  Lanark- 
shire electors  on  the  grounds  that  as  a  miner  he  was 
specially  qualified  to  deal  with  the  interests  of  the  miners, 
and  that  as  a  Scotsman  he  was  specially  qualified  to  deal 
with  Scottish  affairs.  Now,  four  years  later,  he  was 
returned  to  Parliament  by  a  constituency  in  which  there 


WEST  HAM 

was  not  a  single  miner  and  very  few  Scots.  That  the 
miner  from  Scotland  should  have  been  able  to  appeal 
successfully  to  a  London  community  is  indicative  also  of 
a  certain  intellectual  adaptability  on  his  part,  a  capacity 
for  identifying  himself  with  the  mental  and  social  out- 
look of  people  whose  environment  and  habits  of  thought 
were  very  much  different  from  those  in  which  he  himself 
had  been  reared. 

The  success  of  John  Burns  at  Battersea  is  not  so  diffi- 
cult to  understand.  He  was  on  his  native  streets, 
amongst  his  own  people,  and  spoke  in  their  idioms — 
a  Londoner  pf  the  Londoners.  Hardie  was  an  incomer, 
a  foreigner  almost;  and  his  quick  success  in  this  new 
field  of  adventure  cannot  be  wholly  accounted  for,  either 
by  the  strength  of  the  local  Labour  organisation,  which 
was  only  in  its  incipient  stage,  or  by  the  intervention  of 
certain  accidental  circumstances  which  will  be  referred 
to  later.  Hardie's  personality  had  much  to  do  with  his 
success  at  West  Ham,  and  especially  his  power  of  merg- 
ing himself  without  losing  himself  in  the  actual  life  of 
the  people  whom  he  wished  to  serve. 

His  presence  in  West  Ham  was  largely  the  outcome 
of  the  Mid-Lanark  contest,  which  had  attracted  the 
attention  of  advanced  politicians  all  over  the  country, 
and  amongst  them  certain  democrats  in  this  industrial 
district  of  London  who  were  dissatisfied  with  the  Liberal 
Party  policy  and  were  up  in  arms  against  the  local 
party  caucus.  The  I.L.P.  had  not  yet  been  founded, 
but  there  was  a  very  influential  branch  of  the  Land 
Restoration  League  as  the  result  of  Henry  George's 
visit  to  this  country  some  years  previously,  with  groups 
of  Socialists  and  Radicals  anxious  to  try  conclusions 
with  the  orthodox  parties.  From  a  committee  formed 
of  these,  Hardie  received  the  invitation  to  contest  the 
constituency. 

65 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

/  The  rejection  of  financial  help  from  Mr.  Andrew 
V  Carnegie,  and  the  manner  of  the  rejection,  emphasised 
the  fact  that  he  was,  above  all  things,  a  Labour  candi- 
date who  was  not  to  touch  pitch,  however  offered.  Mr. 
Carnegie,  who  was  by  way  of  being  an  uncompromising 
Republican,  was  also,  as  the  whole  world  knew,  a  big 
employer  of  labour  in  America,  and  as  his  employees  at 
Pittsburg  were  at  that  very  time  on  strike  and  were  up 
against  Mr.  Carnegie's  "live  wires"  and  hired  gunmen, 
the  West  Ham  share  of  the  donations  went  to  help  the 
strikers. 

The  election  of  Hardie  and  Burns  was  the  first  prac- 
tical indication  to  the  orthodox  politicians  that  there 
were  new  elements  in  society  with  which  they  would  have 
to  reckon.  Even  yet  they  hardly  realised  the  significance 
of  what  had  taken  place.  They  were  being  kept  too 
busy  with  other  matters  to  be  able  to  take  serious  note 
of  the  new  movement.  Not  without  reason,  they  were 
concerned  with  the  malcontents  of  Ireland  more  than 
with  the  malcontents  of  Labour.  Their  last  Franchise 
Act  had  created  a  formidable  British-Irish  electorate, 
able  to  decide  the  fate  of  governments — or  at  least  so  it 
seemed  for  a  time — an'd  the  rival  competitors  for  parlia- 
mentary power  were  Susy  on  the  one  hand  placating  the 
Irishmen,  and  on  the  other  stirring  up  and  rallying  all 
the  possible  reserves  of  British  prejudice  against  the 
Irish.  They  were,  in  fact,  endeavouring  to  keep  the 
British  voters  divided,  no  longer  merely  as  Liberals  and 
Conservatives,  but  as  Home  Rulers  and  Unionists.  In 
this  they  were  only  too  successful,  but  were  too  engrossed 
in  the  congenial  political  manoeuvring  in  which  British 
statecraft  seems  to  live  and  move  and  have  its  being, 
to  realise  the  significance  of  the  entry  into  Parliament 
of  a  man  like  Hardie.  They  were  to  have  it  fully 
brought  home  to  them  within  the  next  three  years. 

66 


WEST  HAM 

That  Hardie  was  on  this  occasion  favoured  by  a  cer- 
tain element  of  luck  must  be  admitted.  The  local 
Liberal  Party  were  taken  at  a  disadvantage  through  the 
sudden  death  of  their  selected  candidate,  and,  with  little 
time  to  look  for  another  and  the  knowledge  that  Hardie 
had  already  secured  a  strong  following,  they  made  a 
virtue  of  necessity,  and,  though  never  officially  recog- 
nising him,  joined  forces  with  the  forward  section.  They 
even  persuaded  themselves  that  Hardie  could  be 
regarded  as  a  Liberal  Member  and  be  subject  to  official 
party  discipline. 

They  had  no  grounds  for  such  a  belief  in  any  utter- 
ances of  the  Labour  candidate.  On  the  contrary,  he  had 
made  explicit  declarations  of  his  independence  of  party 
control.  CT  desire/5  he  said  in  his  election  address,  <fto 
be  perfectly  frank  with  the  body  of  electors,  as  I  have 
been  with  my  more  immediate  friends  and  supporters  in 
the  constituency.  I  have  all  my  life  given  an  independ- 
ent support  to  the  Liberal  Party,  but  my  first  concern  is 
the  moral  and  material  welfare  of  the  working  classes, 
and  if  returned,  I  will  in  every  case  place  the  claims  of  ^ 
labour  above  those  of  party.  Generally  speaking,  I 
am  in  agreement  with  the  present  programme  of  the 
Liberal  Party  so  far  as  it  goes,  but  I  reserve  to  myself  the 
absolute  and  unconditional  right  to  take  such  action, 
irrespective  of  the  exigencies  of  party  welfare,  as  may  to 
me  seem  needful  in  the  interests  of  the  workers."  At  a 
Conference  of  Trade  Unions,  Temperance  Societies, 
Associations  and  Clubs,  asked  if  he  would  follow  Glad- 
stone, he  answered  :  "So  long  as  he  was  engaged  in  good 
democratic  work,  but  if  he  opposed  Labour  questions  he 
would  oppose  him  or  anybody  else."  "Would  he  joi 
the  Liberal  and  Radical  Party?"  In  reply,  he  said 
"he  expected  to  form  an  Independent  Labour  Party" 

On  these  conditions  he  entered  the  House  of  Commons 

6? 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

untrammelled  and  unpledged — except  to  his  own  con- 
science— perhaps  the  only  free  man  in  that  assembly. 

He  had  hardly  taken  his  seat,  and  the  new  Govern- 
ment had  not  even  been  formed,  when  he  began  to  be 
troublesome  to  the  House  of  Commons'  authorities.    On 
August  1 8th,  we  find  him  interrogating  the  Speaker  as 
to  procedure,  and  as  this  was  his  first  Parliamentary 
utterance  and  foreshadows  fairly    well    his    subsequent 
policy,  the  question  may    be  given    in    full.        "Mr. 
Speaker/'  he  said,  "I  rise  to  put  a  question  of  which  I 
have  given  you  private  notice.    Perhaps  you  will  allow 
me  to  offer  one  word  of  explanation  as  to  why  I  put  the 
question.     On  Thursday,  last  week,  I  gave  notice  of  an 
amendment  to  the  Address,  but  when  the  amendment 
then  before  the  House  was  disposed  of  there  was  so  much 
noise  and  confusion  that  I  did  not  hear  the  main  question 
put,  and  I  anticipated  that  to-.day  there  would  be  an 
opportunity  of  discussing  the  point   embodied  in   my 
amendment.     I  find  that  under  the  ordinary  rules  of  the 
House  there  will  be  no  such  opportunity.    The  question 
which  I  desire  to  put  now,  Sir,  is  whether,  in  view  of  the 
interest  which  has  been  awakened  on  the  question  ctf  hold- 
ing an  autumn  session  for  the  consideration  of  measures 
designed  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  people,  there  is 
any  way  by  which  the  sense  of  the  House  can  now  be 
taken  for  the  guidance  of  the  ministry  now  in  process  of 
formation?"   The  Speaker,  as  was  to  be  expected,  ruled 
that  the  question  could  not  be  raised  until  a  Government 
had  been  formed.    And  as  no  autumn  session  was  held, 
it  was  February  of  next  year  before  Hardie  could  begin 
his  Parliamentary  work  on  behalf  of  the  unemployed. 

An  incident  which  occurred  at  this  time  illustrates 
in  a  very  vivid  way  his  determination  to  keep  himself 
clear  of  all  entanglements  which  might  in  any  way  inter- 
fere with  his  personal  and  political  independence.  It 

68 


WEST   HAM 

had  best  be  described  by  himself,  especially  as  his  man- 
ner of  telling  the  story  brings  out  some  of  those 
characteristics  which  governed  his  actions  all  through  life. 

"  I  was  elected  in  July,  and  on  getting  home  was  told 
that  two  quaintly  dressed  old  ladies  had  spent  a  week 
in  the  village  making  very  exhaustive  inquiries  about 
my  life  and  character.  Later  in  the  year,  we  were 
spending  a  few  days  with  my  wife's  mother,  in  Hamilton, 
and  learned  they  had  been  there  also  and  had  visited 
my  wife's  mother.  They  told  her  frankly  their  errand. 
They  knew  that,  as  a  working  man,  I  would  be  none 
too  flush  of  money,  and  they  were  anxious  to  help  in 
this  respect,  provided  they  were  satisfied  that  I  was 
dependable.  Their  inquiries  into  my  public  character 
were  assuring,  but — was  I  a  good  husband?  A  mother- 
in-law  was  the  best  authority  on  that. 

'  The  upshot  was  that  I  received,  through  an  inter- 
mediary, an  invitation  to  call  upon  them  in  Edinburgh, 
which  I  did.  They  explained  that  from  the  time  of  the 
Parnell  split  they  had  been  helping  to  finance  the 
Parnellite  section  of  the  Irish  Party,  but  that  they  also 
wanted  to  help  Socialism,  and  believed  that  Nationalism 
and  Socialism  would  one  day  be  working  together. 
They  therefore  proposed  to  give  me  a  written  agree- 
ment to  pay  me  £300  a  year  so  long  as  I  remained  in 
Parliament,  and  to  make  provision  for  it  being  con- 
tinued after  they  had  gone.  To  a  man  without  a  shilling, 
and  the  prospect  of  having  to  earn  his  living  somehow, 
the  offer  had  its  practical  advantages,  and  I  promised 
to  think  it  over.  A  few  days  later  I  wrote  declining  the 
proposal,  but  suggesting  as  an  alternative  that  they 
should  give  the  money  to  the  Scottish  Labour  Party, 
the  I.L.P.  not  yet  having  been  formed. 

"  But  this  gave  mighty  offence.  They  had  all  their 
lives  been  accustomed  to  having  things  done  in  their 

Q  69 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

own  way,  and,  as  I  learned  subsequently,  their  attach- 
ment was  to  persons  rather  than  causes.  For  my  part, 
I  was  probably  a  bit  quixotic  and  had  made  up  my  mind 
to  'gang  my  ain  gait'  without  shackle  or  trammel  of  any 
sort  or  kind.  Besides,  I  knew  that  they  had  made  a 
charge  against  a  leading  member  of  the  Land  Restoration 
League  of  having  appropriated  to  his  own  use  money 
intended  for  other  purposes,  and  I  was  taking  no  risks." 
And  thus  it  came  about  that  for  the  second  time  Keir 
Hardie  had  refused  an  income  of  ^300  a  year.  The 
two  elderly  ladies  were  the  Misses  Kippen  of  Edin- 
burgh, and,  as  will  appear,  they  did  not  allow  this  rebuff 
to  destroy  their  interest  in  Hardie's  career,  nor  in  the 
cause  with  which  he  was  identified. 

The  following  year,  during  the  Parliamentary  session, 
an  experience  of  another  kind  provided  him  with  an 
amusing  indication  of  the  insidious  methods  which 
might  be  used  to  influence  his  Parliamentary  conduct. 
He  was  invited  to  a  seance  in  an  artist's  studio,  the 
special  inducement  being  the  prospect  of  a  talk  with 
Robert  Burns.  He  took  with  him  a  number  of  friends, 
Bruce  Wallace,  Frank  Smith,  S.  G.  Hobson  and  others 
well  known  in  the  Labour  movement  of  that  time.  The 
medium  delivered  messages  from  Parnell,  Bradlaugh, 
Bright  and  other  distinguished  persons  resident  in  the 
spirit  world,  including  Robert  Burns,  and  they  all 
with  one  accord  advised  Hardie  to  vote  against  the 
Irish  Home  Rule  Bill !  As  Hardie  supported  Home 
Rule  on  every  possible  occasion,  we  must  suppose  that 
these  eminent  shades  were  duly  disgusted.  Hardie 
never  learned  who  were  responsible  for  the  seance,  but 
they  must  have  taken  him  to  be  a  very  simple-minded 
person — either  that,  or  they  were  so  themselves. 

In  the  interval  between  his  election  and  the  opening 
/  of  his  Parliamentary    career,  an  event  of  even  greater 

70 


I.L.P. 

importance  than  his  election  to  Parliament  had  taken 
place.  The  Independent  Labour  Party  had  been 
formed,  and  when  he  returned  to  Westminster  it  was 
with  the  knowledge  that  there  was  an  organised  body  of 
support  outside.  Even  in  these  first  few  weeks,  how- 
ever, he  had,  partly  by  accident  and  partly  by  design, 
managed  to  become  a  conspicuous  Parliamentary  figure, 
and  to  inaugurate  a  sartorial  revolution  in  that  highly 
conventional  assembly.  The  intrusion  of  the  cloth  cap 
and  tweed  jacket  amongst  the  silk  hats  and  dress  suits 
was  most  disturbing  and  seemed  to  herald  the  near 
approach  of  the  time  when  the  House  of  Commons 
would  ceas'e  to  be  the  gentlemen  of  England's  most 
exclusive  club-room.  It  conveyed  an  ominous  sense  of 
impending  change,  not  at  all  modified  by  the  fact  that 
the  cloth  cap  had  arrived  in  a  two-horse  brake  with  a 
trumpeter  on  the  box.  Hardie's  participation  in  these 
shocks  to  the  House  of  Commons'  sense  of  decency  was 
quite  involuntary.  He  wore  the  clothes  which  were  to 
him  most  comfortable. 

The  charabanc  was  the  outcome  of  the  enthusiasm 
of  a  few  of  his  working-class  constituents  who  desired 
to  convey  their  Member  to  St.  Stephen's  in  style,  and 
being  a  natural  gentleman  always,  he  accepted  their 
company  and  their  equipage  in  the  spirit  in  which  it 
was  preferred.  In  the  result,  the  vulgar  sarcasms  of 
the  press  made  him  the  most  widely  advertised  Member 
of  the  new  Parliament  and  even  for  a  time  overshadowed 
the  discussion  as  to  whether  Rosebery  or  Harcourt 
would  succeed  Gladstone  in  the  premiership. 

Meantime,  while  the  press  humorists  were  making 
merry,  the  Independent  Labour  Party  was  getting  itself 
formed. 

Following  upon  the  formation  of  the  Scottish  Parlia- 
mentary  Labour  Party,  in  1888,  similar  organisations 

71 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

had  sprung  up  in  various  districts  of  England,  notably 
in  Yorkshire  and  Lancashire  and  on  the  North- East 
coast.  All  these  bodies  had  the  same  object,  namely,  the 
return  to  Parliament  of  Labour  Members  who  would  be 
independent  of  the  Liberal  and  Tory  parties. 

A  most  notable  factor  in  bringing  those  organisations 
into  being  was  "The  Workman's  Times,"  founded  in 
1890,  under  the  vigorous  editorship  (and  latterly  pro- 
prietorship) of  Mr.  Joseph  Burgess,  who  in  due  course 
became  a  prominent  personality  in  the  Independent 
Labour  Party,  in  the  formation  of  which  he  took  an 
active  part.  Though  published  in  London,  the  paper, 
through  its  localised  editions,  had  a  considerable 
circulation  throughout  Lancashire  and  Yorkshire, 
especially  amongst  the  textile  workers. 

It  consistently  and  ably  advocated  independent 
Labour  representation,  with  Socialism  as  the  objective. 
It  ceased  to  exist  in  1894,  but  by  that  time  it  had  done 
its  pioneering  work  and  helped  to  make  an  Independent 
Labour  Party  not  only  possible,  but  inevitable. 

There  was  also  the  Social  Democratic  Federation 
operating  chiefly  in  London,  but  with  branches  scattered 
here  and  there  throughout  the  country,  and  having  the 
same  political  objective  as  the  others.  Between  all  these 
bodies,  however,  there  was  no  organised  cohesion,  except 
to  some  extent  in  Scotland,  where  the  Scottish  Labour 
Party  had  brought  into  existence  some  thirty  branches, 
all  affiliated  to  a  Central  Executive,  of  which 
Hardie  was  Secretary.  The  time  had  now  arrived  for 
''unifying  all  these  bodies  into  one  National  Party.  With 
two  independent  Labour  Members  now  in  Parliament 
(for  it  was  fully  believed  that  Burns,  whose  Socialist 
declarations  had  been  even  more  militant  than  Hardie's, 
would  be  sturdily  independent)  it  was  felt  that  a  strong 
organisation  was  needed  in  the  country  to  sustain  and 

Z* 


I.L.P. 

reinforce  these  Parliamentary  representatives  and  to 
formulate  a  policy  which  would  define  clearly  the  { 
Socialist  aspirations  of  the  new  movement.  In  Septem-^ 
her,  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Trades  Union  Congress 
was  held  at  Glasgow.  By  a  greatly  increased  majority, 
the  resolution  in  favour  of  independent  Labour  repre- 
sentation, which  had  been  passed  at  three  previous 
meetings  of  the  Congress,  was  reaffirmed,  but  unlike 
what  had  happened  on  previous  occasions  it  was  not 
allowed  to  fall  into  complete  neglect.  That  same 
day,  an  informal  meeting  of  delegates  favourable  to  the 
formation  of  a  Party  in  conformity  with  the  resolution 
was  held,  and  it  was  decided  that  a  conference  of 
advanced  bodies  willing  to  assist  in  promoting  that 
object  should  be  called. 

On  January  i3th  and  i4th,  1893,  the  conference  was 
held  in  the  Labour  Institute,  Bradford.  Delegates  to 
the  number  of  one  hundred  and  twenty-one  mustered 
from  all  parts  of  England  and  Scotland.  All  manner 
of  Labour  and  Socialist  societies  were  represented,  the 
chief  however  being  Labour  clubs,  branches  of  the 
Social  Democratic  Federation  and  the  Fabian  Society, 
the  Scottish  Labour  Party,  and  several  trade  organisa- 
tions. Keir  Hardie  was  elected  Chairman,  and  despite 
many  forebodings  of  dissension  and  failure,  the  gather- 
ing set  itself  to  the  task  of  formulating  a  constitution 
in  a  thoroughly  earnest  and  harmonious  spirit.  The 
name  "Independent  Labour  Party,"  which  had  already 
become  a  common  appellation  of  the  new  movement  and 
had  been  assumed  by  many  of  the  local  clubs,  was 
adopted  almost  unanimously  in  preference  to  that  of  the 
"Socialist  Labour  Party." 

Without  hesitation,  however,  the  Conference  declared 
the  primary  object  of  the  Party  to  be  the  "collective^ 
N  ownership  and  control  of  the   means  of  production,    dis- 

73 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

tribution,  and  exchange."  Thus,  though  rejecting  the 
word  Socialist  from  its  title,  the  Party  became  an 
avowedly  Socialist  or  Social  Democratic  organisation. 
Among  the  delegates  present  at  this  historic  Conference 
were  Bernard  Shaw,  Robert  Blatchford,  Pete  Curran, 
Robert  Smillie,  Katherine  St.  John  Conway  (afterwards 
Mrs.  Bruce  Glasier),  F.  W.  Jowett,  Joseph  Burgess, 
James  Sexton,  Ben  Tillett,  Russell  Smart,  and  many 
other  notable  workers  for  Socialism. 

Mr.  Shaw  Maxwell,  well  known  in  Glasgow  Labour 
circles,  but  at  that  time  resident  in  London,  was  appointed 
Secretary,  and  Mr.  John  Lister,  of  Halifax,  Treasurer. 
The  National  Administrative  Council  consisted  of  dele- 
gates representing  the  London  District,  the  Midland 
Counties,  the  Northern  Counties,  and  Scotland,  their 
names  being  :  Katherine  St.  John  Conway,  Dr.  Aveling, 
son-in-law  of  Karl  Marx,  Pete  Curran,  Joseph  Burgess, 
Alfred  Settle,  William  Johnson,  W.  H.  Drew,  J.  C. 
Kennedy,  George  S.  Christie,  A.  Field,  A.  W.  Buttery, 
William  Small,  George  Carson  and  R.  Chisholm 
Robertson. 

Not  all  of  those  who  took  part  in  these  memorable 
proceedings  were  able  to  continue  their  allegiance 
through  the  years  of  storm  and  trouble  which  followed. 
Robert  Blatchford,  failing  to  get  the  constitution  made 
as  watertight  against  compromise  as  he  desired,  in  due 
course  seceded.  Others  fell  away  for  exactly  the 
opposite  reason,  because  the  constitution,  from  their 
point  of  view,  lacked  elasticity.  On  the  whole,  however, 
the  defectionists  were  comparatively  few,  and  even 
they  could  not  undo  the  work  they  had  helped  to  accom- 
plish in  those  two  eventful  days  in  Bradford.  They  had 
founded  one  of  the  most  remarkable  organisations  that 
has  ever  existed  in  this  or  any  other  country — a  political 
party  and  something  more — a  great  social  fellowship, 

74 


I.L.P. 

joining  together  in  bonds  of  friendship  all  its  adherents 
in  every  part  of  the  land  and  forming  a  communion 
comparable  to  that  of  some  religious  fraternity  whose 
members  have  taken  vows  of  devotion  to  a  common 
cause. 

This  fraternal  spirit  was  the  outcome  of  the  nature  and 
method  of  the  propaganda  carried  on  by  the  new  Party 
and  of  the  character  of  the  propagandists,  who  were 
mostly  of  the  rank  and  file;  and  also  of  the  character  of 
the  Party  newspaper,  which  made  its  appearance  almost 
simultaneously  with  the  Party  itself.  The  "Labour 
Leader,"  promoted  by  the  Scottish  Labour  Party  on  the 
initiative  of  Hardie,  and  edited  by  him,  came  out  as  a 
monthly  periodical  devoted  to  the  interests  of  the  I.L.P. 

On  entering  Parliament,  he  had  quickly  realised  that 
if  he  were  to  be  able  to  stand  there  alone,  ostracised  as 
he  was  sure  to  be  by  all  the  other  parties,  and  subject 
to  the  misrepresentations  of  the  entire  political  press, 
he  would  require  at  least  one  newspaper  which  would 
keep  him  right  with  his  own  people.  Its  most  valuable 
feature  for  promoting  a  sense  of  unity  and  fellowship 
amongst  the  readers  consisted  in  the  brief  reports  of  the 
doings  of  the  branches  in  the  various  districts,  whereby 
they  were  brought  together,  so  to  speak,  all  the  year 
round.  Men  and  women  who  had  never  met  face  to  face, 
nevertheless  got  to  feel  an  intimate  comradeship  the  one 
with  the  other. 

During  the  first  year,  the  "Labour  Leader"  was  pro- 
duced monthly,  and  afterwards  weekly.  It  had,  as  we 
shall  see,  amongst  its  contributors  writers  and  artists  of 
great  ability,  some  of  them  perhaps  with  a  greater  literary 
gift  than  Hardie  himself,  but  throughout  it  continued  to 
be  mainly  the  expression  of  Hardie' s  personality.  It 
came  to  be  spoken  of  by  friends  and  enemies  alike  as 
"Keir  Hardie's  paper.55 

75 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

At  this  period  he  had  good  reason  to  be  satisfied  with 
the  way  things  were  going.  He  had  gained  a  footing  in 
Parliament,  and  had  sufficient  confidence  in  himself  to 
believe  that  from  that  position  he  could  command  the 
attention  of  the  nation  to  the  questions  in  which  he  was 
interested.  The  political  party  for  which  he  had 
laboured  incessantly  during  five  strenuous  years,  had 
now  come  into  existence  and  promised  to  become  a 
power  in  the  land.  And  he  had  control  of  a  newspaper 
which,  though  limited  in  size  and  circulation,  yet  enabled 
him  to  reach  that  section  of  the  community  whose  support 
he  most  valued.  All  this  meant  more  and  ever  more 
work,  but  he  was  not  afraid  of  work.  It  was  the  kind 
of  work  he  loved,  for  the  people  he  loved.  It  was  the 
work  for  which  he  believed  himself  fitted  and  destined. 
And  in  this  frame  of  mind  he  prepared  to  resume  his 
Parliamentary  duties. 

Hardie  had  no  illusions  as  to  the  kind  of  environment 
into  which  he  was  now  entering  and  certainly  had  no 
expectations  that  the  new  Government  would  willingly 
provide  him  with  opportunities  for  realising  his  avowed 
purpose  of  forming  a  new  party  in  the  House.  The 
Tory  opposition  was  simply  the  usual  Tory  opposition 
with  only  one  immediate  object  in  view,  to  defeat  the 
Government  and  step  into  its  place.  On  both  sides  all 
the  vested  interests  of  capital  and  land  were  strongly 
represented.  There  were  fifteen  avowed  Labour  Mem- 
bers in  the  House,  but  of  these  only  three  had  been 
returned  independent  of  party — John  Burns,  J.  Have- 
lock  Wilson  and  Hardie  himself.  The  others  had  long 
ago  proved  themselves  to  be  very  plastic  political 
material.  It  was  hoped  that  the  three  Independents 
would  hold  together,  but  that  had  yet  to  be  proved — or 
disproved.  Hardie  was  not  disposed  to  wait  too  long 
for  developments.  The  unemployed  were  demon- 


HOUSE   OF   COMMONS 

strating  daily  on  the  Embankment  and  he  had  pledged 
himself  to  raise  the  question  of  unemployment.  What- 
ever the  others  might  do,  he  was  going  to  keep  his  word. 
The  Government,  playing  for  time  to  produce  its 
Home  Rule  measure,  had  in  the  Queen's  Speech  out- 
lined a  colourless  legislative  programme  which,  while 
referring  vaguely  to  agricultural  depression,  quite 
ignored  the  industrial  distress.  Upon  this  omission 
Hardie  based  his  initial  appeal  to  the  House  of 
Commons. 

On  February  ;th,  1893,  he  made  his  first  speech  in  the 
House  of  Commons  in  moving  the  following  amend- 
ment to  the  Address  :  "To  add,  'And  further,  we  humbly 
desire  to  express  our  regret  that  Your  Majesty  has  not 
been  advised  when  dealing  with  agricultural  depression 
to  refer  also  to  the  industrial  depression  now  prevailing 
and  the  widespread  misery  due  to  large  numbers  of  the 
working  class  being  unable  to  find  employment,  and 
direct  Parliament  to  legislate  promptly  and  effectively 
in  the  interests  of  the  unemployed.'  There  was  a 
large  attendance  of  members  curious  to  see  how  this 
reputed  firebrand  would  comport  himself  in  the  legislative 
chamber.  If  there  were  any  there  who  expected,  and 
perhaps  hoped,  to  hear  a  noisy,  declamatory  utterance  s 
in  consonance  with  their  conception  of  working-class 
agitational  oratory,  they  were  disappointed.  He  spoke 
quietly  and  argumentatively,  but  with  an  earnestness 
which  held  the  attention  of  the  House. 

"It  is  a  remarkable  fact,"  he  began,  "that  the  speech 
of  Her  Majesty  should  refer  to  one  section  of  industrial 
distress  and  leave  the  other  altogether  unnoticed,  and 
there  are  some  of  us  who  think  that,  if  the  interests  of 
the  landlords  were  not  bound  up  so  closely  with  the 
agricultural  depression,  the  reference  even  to  the  agricul- 
tural labourers  would  not  have  appeared  in  the  Queen's 

77 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

speech."  He  went  on  to  justify  his  action  in  moving 
the  amendment  by  referring  to  his  election  pledges  to 
raise  the  question  of  unemployment  in  Parliament.  He 
spoke  of  the  extent  of  the  evil  and  quoted  the  trade 
union  returns  to  show  that  1,300,000  workers  were  in 
receipt  of  out-of-work  pay,  and  he  based  upon  these  and 
Poor  Law  statistics,  the  statement  that  not  less  than 
4,000,000  people  were  without  visible  means  of  support. 
His  amendment  had  been  objected  to,  he  said,  because 
it  contained  no  specific  proposal  for  dealing  with  the  evil. 
Had  it  done  so  it  would  have  been  objected  to  still  more, 
because  every  one  who  wanted  to  find  an  excuse  for  not 
voting  for  the  amendment  would  have  discovered  it 
in  whatever  proposals  he  might  have  made.  The 
House  would  agree  that  he  had  high  authority 
in  this  House  for  "not  disclosing  the  details  of 
our  proposals  until  we  are  in  a  position  to  give  effect  to 
them" — which  was  not  quite  in  his  power  yet.  Mean- 
time, the  Government,  being  a  large  employer  of  labour, 
might  do  something  for  the  immediate  relief  of  the  dis- 
tress then  prevailing.  It  could  abolish  overtime,  about 
which  he  had  heard  complaints.  It  could  increase  the 
minimum  wage  of  labourers  in  the  dockyards  and  arsenals 
to  sixpence  per  hour,  and  it  could  enact  a  forty-eight 
hour  week  for  all  Government  employees.  It  had  been 
estimated  that,  were  the  hours  of  railway  servants  reduced 
to  eight  per  day,  employment  would  be  found  for  150,000 
extra  workingmen.  The  Government  might  also  establish 
what  is  known  as  home  colonies  on  the  idle  lands  about 
which  they  heard  so  much  discussion  in  that  House. 
One  of  the  most  harrowing  features  connected  with  the 
problem  of  the  unemployed  was  not  the  poverty  or  the 
hardship  they  had  to  endure,  but  the  fearful  moral  degrad- 
ation that  followed  in  the  train  of  enforced  idleness.  In 
every  season  of  the  year  and  in  every  condition  of  trade, 

78 


HOUSE   OF   COMMONS 

men  were  unemployed.  The  pressure  under  which) 
industry  was  carried  on  to-day  necessitated  that  the  young 
and  the  strong  and  the  able  should  have  preference  in 
obtaining  employment,  and  if  the  young,  the  strong  and 
the  able  were  to  have  the  preference,  then  the  middle- 
aged  and  the  aged  must,  of  necessity,  be  thrown  on  the 
street.  They  were  now  discussing  an  address  of  thanks 
to  Her  Majesty  for  her  speech.  He  wanted  to  ask  the 
Government,  what  have  the  unemployed  to  thank  Her 
Majesty  for  in  the  speech  which  had  been  submitted 
to  the  House?  Their  case  was  overlooked  and  ignored. 
They  were  left  out  as  if  they  did  not  exist. 

This  amendment  was  seconded  by  Colonel  Howard 
Vincent,  a  Tory  Member,  and  in  the  division  he  had  the 
support  of  many  Tories  who  were,  doubtless,  more 
anxious  to  weaken  the  Government  than  to  help  the 
unemployed,  Sir  John  Gorst  being  probably  the  only 
member  of  that  Party  who  was  sincere  in  his  approval 
of  Hardie's  action.  John  Burns  did  not  take  part  in  the 
debate,  while  Cremer,  a  Liberal-Labour  Member  and 
actually  one  of  the  founders  of  the  International,  spoke 
against  the  amendment  and  explained  that  he  had 
already  put  himself  "right  with  his  constituents,";  so 
that,  literally,  Hardie  stood  alone  as  an  Independent 
Labour  representative  voicing  the  claims  of  the 
unemployed  worker  in  his  first  challenge  to  capital- 
ism upon  the  floor  of  the  House  of  Commons. 
One  hundred  and  nine  Members  voted  with  Hardie, 
276  against  him.  -  The  division  was  mainly  on 
party  lines.  He  had  proved  that  honesty  is  the 
best  tactics  and  had  successfully  exploited  the 
party  system  for  his  own  purpose.  The  spectacle  of 
the  Liberals  voting  against  the  unemployed,  and  the 
Ayrshire  miner  leading  the  Tory  rank  and  file  into  the 
revolutionary  lobby  was  not  calculated  to  enhance  the 

79 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

credit  of  either  of  these  official  parties.  The  Liberals 
never  forgave  him  for  having  compelled  them  to  make 
exposure  of  their  own  inherent  reactionism. 

The  approval  or  disapproval  of  either  of  the  official 
parties  did  not  affect  Hardie  in  the  slightest  degree,  and 
he  continued  to  seize  every  opportunity  which  the  Rules 
of  the  House  allowed  to  give  publicity  to  the  grievances 
of  all  classes  of  workers.  A  mere  list  of  the  questions 
which  he  asked  during  his  first  Parliamentary  session 
almost  forms  an  index  to  the  social  conditions  of  the 
country  at  that  time.  On  the  same  day  on  which  he 
moved  his  unemployment  amendment,  we  find  him 
asking  the  Postmaster-General  to  state  why  certain  Post 
Office  officials  had  been  refused  leave  to  attend  a  meeting 
of  the  Fawcett  Association.  On  March  ;th,  he  was 
inquiring  as  to  the  dismissal,  without  reason  assigned, 
of  certain  prison  warders.  On  the  Qth,  he  was  back  again 
at  the  unemployment  question,  demanding  from  the 
Local  Government  Board  information  as  to  the  number 
of  unemployed  in  the  various  industries,  and  what  steps 
local  authorities  were  taking  to  deal  with  the  matter. 
On  the  loth,  he  wanted  to  know  why  men  on  strike  had 
been  prosecuted  for  playing  musical  instruments  and 
collecting  money,  while  organ-grinders  and  others  were 
not  interfered  with  for  doing  the  same  thing.  On  the 
1 3th,  he  inquired  whether  it  was  intended  to  submit  a 
measure  that  Session  to  enable  local  authorities  to  deal 
effectively  with  the  severe  distress  prevailing  all  over  the 
country,  and  followed  this  up  with  another  question 
indicating  how  this  could  be  done.  This  question  is  still 
so  relevant  to  present-day  problems  that  it  may  be  given 
in  full  :  "I  beg  to  ask  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer 
whether  he  contemplates,  in  connection  with  the  Budget 
proposals  for  next  year,  such  a  rearrangement  of  the 
system  of  taxation  as  is  known  as  a  graduated  Income 

80 


HOUSE   OF    COMMONS 

Tax,  by  means  of  which  the  contribution  to  the  revenue, 
local  and  imperial,  would  bear  a  relative  proportion  to 
income;  also  whether  he  will  make  such  provision  in  the 
Budget  estimates  for  next  year  as  would  enable  the  Local 
Government  Board  to  make  grants  to  any  Board  of 
Guardians,  Town  and  County  Councils,  or  committees 
of  responsible  citizens  willing  to  acquire  land  or  other 
property  and  to  undertake  the  responsibility  of  organising 
the  unemployed  in  home  colonies  and  affording  them 
the  opportunity  of  providing  the  accessories  of  life  for 
themselves  and  those  dependent  on  them."  The  same  day 
he  was  inquisitive  as  to  the  pay  of  House  of  Commons' 
policemen.  On  April  I3th,  he  raised  the  question  of  the 
inadequacy  of  the  staff  of  Factory  Inspectors,  and  wanted 
to  know  whether  it  was  proposed  to  appoint  sub- 
inspectors  from  the  ranks  of  duly  qualified  men  and 
women  who  had  themselves  worked  in  the  factories  and 
workshops. 

On  this  day  also,  he  put  the  first  of  a  series  of  questions 
which  continued  daily,  like  the  chapters  in  a  serial  story, 
for  the  following  five  weeks,  and  gave  conspicuous  illus- 
tration of  the  alliance  of  the  Government  with  the  employ- 
ing classes  against  the  workers.  What  is  known 
in  the  history  of  industrial  revolt  as  the  Hull  Dockt- 
Strike  had  broken  out,  and  the  Government  had,  with 
great  alacrity,  sent  soldiers  and  gunboats  to  the  scene 
of  the  dispute.  Day  after  day  Hardie  attacked  the 
Government  in  the  only  way  available,  with  questions, 
some  of  which  were  ruled  out  of  order,  but  many  of 
which  had  to  be  answered,  either  evasively  or  with  a 
direct  negative,  but,  either  way,  revealing  the  Govern- 
ment bias.  "Had  the  shipowners  refused  all  efforts  at 
a  compromise  or  towards  conciliation?"  "In  these  cir- 
cumstances, would  the  Government  order  the  withdrawal 
of  the  military  forces ?"  "By  whose  authority  were  the 

81 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

military  and  naval  forces  of  the  State  sent  to  Hull  to  aid 
the  shipowners  in  breaking  up  a  Trade  Union  registered 
under  an  Act  of  Parliament?"  The  answers  not  being 
satisfactory,  he  moved  the  adjournment  of  the  House  in 
order  to  get  the  whole  question  of  military  interference 
discussed,  but  less  than  forty  Members  rose,  and,  says 
"Hansard,"  "business  proceeded."  Nothing  daunted, 
he  returned  to  the  attack,  and  asked  the  Secretary  of 
State  for  War  whether  he  was  aware  that  soldiers  were 
being  used  at  Hull  in  loading  and  unloading  ships.  He 
asked  Asquith  whether  a  lady  journalist  who  had  taken 
part  in  a  meeting  of  locked-out  dockers  had  been  refused 
access  to  the  docks  by  police?  He  asked  particulars 
regarding  the  number  of  magistrates  at  Hull ;  how  many 
w,ere  shipowners  or  dock  directors,  and  how  many  were 
working  men,  and  elicited  the  following  illuminative 
reply  : — 

''Thirty-nine  magistrates,  of  whom  there  are  four 
shipowners,  nineteen  shareholders  in  ships.  Dock 
directors  (no  information).  No  working  men." 

He  followed  this  up  with  the  question  :  "Was  a  Bench 
composed  exclusively  of  shipowners  and  dock  directors 
capable  of  giving  an  unbiassed  opinion  on  the  question 
of  the  means  desirable  to  be  taken  for  the  protection  of 
their  own  property  ?  Was  it  true  that  additional  forces 
had  been  requisitioned,  and  were  they  to  be  sent?"  The 
answer  was  :  "Yes."  "Was  the  chief  obstacle  to  a  settle- 
ment of  the  dispute  a  Member  of  this  House  and  a  sup- 
porter of  the  Government  (the  reference  being  to  Wilson, 
of  the  Shipping  Federation)?"  but  this  was  ruled  out  of 
order  by  the  Speaker  as  being  a  matter  "  not  under  the 
cognisance  and  control  of  the  Government." 

Day  after  day,  and  week  after  week,  he  persisted  with 
his  damaging  catechism.  Burns  and  Havelock  Wilson 
joined  him  from  time  to  time,  until  at  last  a  day  was 

82 


HOUSE   OF    COMMONS 

granted  to  the  latter  to  move  a  resolution  on  the  question, 
he,  as  secretary  of  the  Trade  Union  most  deeply 
involved,  being  recognised  as  specially  representative  of 
the  men  on  strike.  A  big  debate  ensued  in  which  Front 
Bench  men  took  part,  and  during  which  Hardie  delivered 
an  impassioned  speech  of  considerable  length.  Burns, 
Cremer  and  Hardie  all  urged  Havelock  Wilson  to  divide 
the  House  on  the  question,  but  that  gentleman,  for 
reasons  which  he  doubtless  thought  satisfactory,  with- 
drew the  resolution.  Finally,  the  strike  ended,  like 
many  others  before  and  since,  as  a  drawn  battle  in  which 
the  workers  were  the  chief  sufferers.  Never  before  had 
any  Labour  dispute  occupied  so  much  of  the  time  of  the 
House  of  Commons — a  fact  due  to  the  presence  there 
of  one  man  whose  sense  of  duty  to  his  class  was  too 
strong  to  be  overborne  by  regard  for  Parliamentary 
etiquette  or  party  exigencies.  He  was  pursuing,  in  the 
interests  of  labour,  the  same  tactics  which  the  Parnellites 
had,  up  to  a  point,  pursued  so  effectively  in  the  interests 
of  Nationalism,  and,  had  it  been  possible  to  have 
gathered  round  him  at  that  time  a  group  of  a  dozen  men 
prepared  resolutely  to  adhere  to  that  policy,  the  sub- 
sequent history  of  Labour  in  Parliament  would  have  been 
much  different  from  what  it  has  been.  The  dozen 
men  were  there,  but  they  were  bound  by  party  ties, 
and  lacked  both  the  courage  and  the  vision  of  Hardie. 
As  it  was,  he  had  redeemed  his  promise  to  form  an 
Independent  Labour  Party  in  the  House.  He  had 
formed  a  Party  of  one.  And  before  that  Parliament 
came  to  an  end,  both  Liberals  and  Tories  had  to  bear 
witness  to  its  vitality  and  effectiveness. 

Meantime  the  I.L.P.  outside  was  growing,  thanks  not 
a  little  to  the  advertisement  it  was  getting  from  West- 
minster. The  first  Annual  Conference  at  Manchester, 
in  January,  1894,  found  it  with  two  hundred  and  eighty 

83 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

affiliated  branches.  At  the  Conference,  Hardie  was 
elected  Chairman;  Tom  Mann,  then  an  enthusiastic 
recruit,  undertook  the  secretaryship.  Ben  Tillett — with 
a  growing  reputation  as  an  agitator,  and  strange  though 
it  may  seem,  something  of  a  Puritan  in  social  habits- 
joined  the  National  Council.  Reports  from  the  districts 
showed  that  the  Party  would  be  well  represented  in  the 
Municipal  elections  during  the  next  November,  and 
would  thus  have  an  opportunity  of  testing  in  some 
degree  its  electoral  support  throughout  the  country. 
The  I.L.P.  was  an  established  factor  in  the  political 
life  of  the  nation. 


84 


CHAPTER  FIVE 

STANDING   ALONE' — THE    MEMBER    FOR    THE    UNEMPLOYED 

HARDIE  was  as  indefatigable  outside  of  Parlia- 
ment as  inside,  addressing  propaganda  meetings 
all  over  the  country,  writing  encouraging  letters 
to    branch     secretaries,    and     editing     the    "Labour 
Leader,"    which    on    March    3ist,     1894,    became    a 
weekly,    and    for    the    financing    and    management    of 
which    he    made    himself    wholly    responsible.        The 
wages    bill    of    the    paper,    exclusive    of    printing,    he 
estimated  at  ,£750  a  year,  which  he  hoped  would  be 
covered  by  income  from  sales  and  advertisements,  an 
optimistic  miscalculation  which  involved    him  in    con- 
siderable worry  later  on,  when  he  found  it  necessary  to 
dispense  with  much  of  the  paid  service  and  rely  to  some 
extent  upon  voluntary  work  by  enthusiasts  in  the  cause, 
who,  it  should  be  said  here,  seldom  failed  him.     The 
first  weekly  number  contained  Robert  Smillie's  election 
address  as  Labour  Candidate  for  Mid-Lanark,  where 
a  by-election  in  which  Hardie  took  an  active  part  was 
again  being  fought.     In  the  "Leader,"  Hardie  had  an 
article  on  the  election,  a  leading  article  on  Lord  Rose- 
bery  as  prospective   Premier,   and  a  page  of  intimate 
chat  with  his  readers  under  the  heading  of  "  Entre  Nous" 
afterwards  changed  to  the  plain  English  of  "  Between 
Ourselves,"  and  this  quantity  of  journalistic  output  he 
continued  for   years,  while  shirking  none  of    the  other 
work  that  came  to  him  as  an  agitator  and  public  man. 
This  number  contained  also  an  article  by  Cunninghame 

H  85 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Graham,  the  I.L.P.  Monthly  Report  by  Tom  Mann, 
"News  of  the  Movement  at  Home  and  Abroad,"  besides 
literary  sketches  and  verses  by  various  contributors.  The 
paper  was  edited  from  London,  but  printed  in  Glasgow 
and  distributed  from  there.  There  was  a  working  staff 
at  both  ends.  Of  the  London  experiences,  Councillor 
Ben  Gardner  of  West  Ham  could  doubtless  give  some 
interesting  reminiscences,  while  George  D.  Hardie, 
Keir's  younger  brother,  could  do  the  same  for  Glasgow. 
At  the  end  of  the  first  six  months,  David  Lowe,  a  young 
enthusiast  from  Dundee,  with  literary  tastes  and 
Socialist  beliefs,  came  in  as  sub-editor  and  to  an 
appreciable  extent  relieved  Hardie  of  some  of  the 
management  worries,  besides  adding  somewhat  to  the 
literary  flavour  of  the  paper. 

With  the  re-assembling  of  Parliament,  Hardie  re- 
sumed his  efforts  to  focus  attention  on  the  unemployment 
question,  but  on  bringing  forward  his  resolution,  found 
himself  up  against  a  dead  wall  in  the  shape  of  a  count- 
out.  By  this  time,  also,  his  harassing  of  the  Government 
had  raised  the  ire  of  West  Ham  Liberals  who  had  not 
bargained  for  quite  so  much  militancy  on  the  part  of 
their  representative.  From  them  he  received  numerous 
letters  of  protest  with  threats  of  opposition  at  the  next 
election.  To  these  he  made  a  reply  which  defined  most 
explicitly  at  once  his  own  personal  attitude  and  the 
Parliamentary  policy  of  the  I.L.P. 

"The  I.L.P.,"  he  said,  "starts  from  the  assumption 
,  that  the  worker  should  be  as  free  industrially  and 
economically  as  he  is  supposed  to  be  politically,  that  the 
land  and  the  instruments  of  production  should  be  owned 
by  the  community  and  should  be  used  in  producing  the 
requisites  to  maintain  a  healthy  and  happy  existence. 
The  men  who  are  to  achieve  these  reforms  must  be  under 
no  obligation  whatever  to  either  the  landlord  or  the 

86 


STANDING  ALONE 

capitalist,  or  to  any  party  or  organisation  representing 
these  interests.  Suppose,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that 
twenty  members  would  be  returned  to  Parliament  who 
were  nominally  Labour  Members  but  who  owed  their 
election  to  a  compromise  with  the  Liberals,  what  would 
the  effect  be  upon  their  action  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons ?  When  questions  affecting  the  interest  of  property 
were  at  stake,  or  when  they  desired  to  take  action  to 
compel  social  legislation  of  a  drastic  character,  the 
threat  would  be  always  hanging  over  them  that  unless 
they  were  obedient  to  the  party  Whip  and  maintained 
party  discipline  they  would  be  opposed.  In  my  own 
case,  this  threat  has  been  held  out  so  often  that  it  is 
beginning  to  lose  its  effect.  I  have  no  desire  to  hold 
the  seat  on  sufferance  and  at  the  mercy  of  those  who  are 
not  in  agreement  with  me,  and  am  quite  prepared  to  be 
defeated  when  the  election  comes  round.  But  I  cannot 
agree  to  compromise  my  independence  of  action  in  even 
the  slightest  degree."  This  plain  speaking  was  not 
relished  by  his  Liberal  critics,  and  at  one  of  his  meetings 
in  the  constituency  there  was  some  rowdyism. 

In  the  first  month  of  this  particular  session,  he  had 
the  satisfaction  of  speaking  in  support  of  the  Miners' 
Eight  Hours'  Day  Bill,  which  he  himself  had  helped  to 
draft  years  before,  and  of  seeing  the  Second  Reading 
carried  by  a  majority  of  81.  This  result  did  not,  of 
course,  ensure  its  immediately  becoming  law,  for  the 
obstructive  resources  of  capitalism  in  Parliament  and 
the  opposition  of  two  sections  of  the  miners  were 
strong  enough  to  prevent  that  for  many  years  to  come. 
At  this  time1  we  also  find  him  addressing  meetings 
in  South  Wales,  as  a  result  of  which  the  I.L.P.  got  a 
footing  in  the  Principality  which  it  has  held  ever  since. 
He  had  probably  no  premonition  of  how  close  would 
yet  be  his  own  connection  with  Wales  and  the  Welsh 

87 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

people.  But  he  had  made  a  good  beginning  towards 
winning  their  gratitude,  for  it  was  doubtless  as  the 
natural  sequel  to  his  Welsh  visit  that  in  June  he  blocked 
the  Cardiff  Dock  Bill  and  forced  thereby  the  withdrawal 
of  a  clause  which  imposed  a  tariff  of  twopence  on  each 
passenger  landed  at  Cardiff  and  a  charge  for  luggage. 

And  now,  certain  events  happened  in  the  world  which 
produced  for  Hardie  a  more  trying  parliamentary  ordeal 
than  he  had  yet  faced,  and  tested  his  moral  courage  to 
the  full.  Let  us  look  at  these  events  in  the  sequence  in 
which  they  presented  themselves  to  Hardie,  and  we  shall 
be  the  better  able  to  understand  the  feelings  and  motives 
which  impelled  him  to  act  as  he  did. 

On  June  23rd  a  terrible  explosion  occurred  at  the 
Albion  Colliery,  Cilfynydd,  South  Wales,  by  which  two 
hundred  and  sixty  men  and  boys  lost  their  lives.  On 
the  same  day  a  child  was  born  to  the  Duchess  of  York. 
On  the  following  day,  June  24th,  M.  Carnot,  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  French  Republic,  was  assassinated.  On 
June  26th,  70,000  Scottish  miners  came  out  on  strike 
against  a  reduction  of  wages. 

Now  turn  to  the  House  of  Commons.  On  June  25th, 
Sir  William  Harcourt  moved  a  vote  of  condolence  with 
the  French  people.  On  June  28th,  the  same  Cabinet 
Minister  moved  an  address  of  congratulation  to  the 
Queen  on  the  birth  of  the  aforesaid  royal  infant.  Never 
a  word  of  sympathy  for  the  relatives  of  the  miners  who 
had  been  killed  :  never  a  word  of  reference  to  the  serious 
state  of  affairs  in  the  Scottish  coalfield.  Only  one  man 
protested.  That  man  was  Keir  Hardie. 

The  House  of  Commons'  situation  developed  in 
the  following  manner.  When  Harcourt  gave  notice 
of  his  intention  to  move  the  vote  of  condolence  with 
the  French  people,  Hardie  inquired  whether  a  vote  of 
sympathy  would  also  be  moved  to  the  relatives  of  the 

88 


STANDING  ALONE 

two  hundred  and  sixty  victims  of  the  Welsh  colliery 
disaster.  "  Oh,  no/'  said  Sir  William,  "  I  can  dispose 
of  that  now  by  saying  that  the  House  does  sympathise 
with  these  poor  people."  Hardie  put  down  a  notice  of 
an  addition  to  the  motion,  in  which  the  Queen  was  to  be 
also  asked  to  express  sympathy  with  the  Welsh  miners' 
friends,  and  the  House  to  be  asked  to  express  its  detesta- 
tion of  the  system  which  made  the  periodic  sacrifices 
of  miners'  lives  inevitable.  His  amendment  was  ruled 
out  of  order,  but  when  the  congratulatory  motion  came 
on  he  exercised  his  right  to  speak  against  it,  as,  he  said, 
"  in  the  interests  of  the  dignity  of  the  House,  and  in 
protest  against  the  Leader  of  the  House  of  Commons 
declining  to  take  official  cognisance  of  the  terrible  col- 
liery accident  in  South  Wales."  He  stood  alone, 
deserted  by  every  other  Member,  including  Labour's 
representatives,  and  faced  a  scene  of  well-nigh  un- 
exampled intolerance.  A  writer  in  the  "West  Ham 
Herald,"  describing  it,r  wrote  :  "I've  been  in  a  wild  beast 
show  at  feeding  time.  I've  been  at  a  football  match 
when  a  referee  gave  a  wrong  decision.  I've  been  at 
rowdy  meetings  of  the  Shoreditch  vestry  and  the  West 
Ham  Corporation,  but  in  all  my  natural  life  I  have  never 
witnessed  a  scene  like  this.  They  howled  and  yelled 
and  screamed,  but  he  stood  his  ground."  Outside, 
sections  of  the  press  acted  i!n  much  the  same  way  as 
the  House  of  Commons'  hooligans,  and  tried  to  represent 
his  action  as  a  vulgar  attack  on  Royalty.  It  was, 
primarily,  not  an  attack  on  Royalty.  He  was  certainly 
a  Republican,  but  like  most  Socialists  he  regarded  the 
Monarchy  as  simply  an  appanage  of  the  political  and 
social  system,  which  would  disappear  asx  a  matter  of 
course  when  the  system  disappeared,  and  had  it  not 
been  that  the  juxtaposition  of  events  threw  up  in  such 
glaring  contrast  the  sycophancy  of  society  where  Royalty 


j 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

was  concerned,  and  its  heartlessness  where  the  common 
people,  were  concerned,  he  would  probably  have  allowed 
the  vote  of  congratulation  to  go  through  without  inter- 
vention from  him.  But  he  was  in  fact  deeply  stirred  in 
a  way  which  these  people  could  not  understand.  He 
had  brought  with  him  into  Parliament  a  humanism  which 
was  greater  than  ceremony  and  deeper  than  formality. 
He  was  a  miner,  and  to  him  the  unnecessary  death  of 
one  miner  was  of  more  concern  than  the  birth  of  any 
number  of  royal  princes.  He  regarded  these  two  hun- 
dred and  sixty  deaths  as  two  hundred  and  sixty  murders. 
He  knew  that  this  colliery  had  long  before  been  reported 
on  as  specially  dangerous,  and  that  no  preventive 
measures  had  been  taken.  He  understood,  only  too 
well,  the  grief  and  desolation  of  the  bereaved  women 
and  children.  He  had  been  through  it  all  in  his  early 
Lanarkshire  days,  and  he  was  righteously  and  passion- 
ately indignant.  The  jeers  and  hootings  from  Members 
of  Parliament  and  abuse  from  the  press  did  not  matter 
to  him  at  all.  He  took  his  stand  because  it  was  the  only 
thing  he  could  do,  and  the  receipt  of  nearly  a  thousand 
letters  of  approval  from  people  in  all  social  grades  con- 
vinced him  that  besides  satisfying  his  own  impulses,  he 
had  voiced  a  deep  sentiment  in  the  country. 

Hardie  was  now  nearly  thirty-eight  years  of  age,  and 
a  recognised  outstanding  figure  in  British  political  life. 
An  unusual  man,  amenable  neither  to  flatteries  nor  to 
threatenings — one  who  could  not  be  ignored.  An 
impression  of  him,  contributed  to  the  "Weekly  Times 
and  Echo"  by  John  K.  Kenworthy  in  this  same  month 
of  June,  1894,  is  worth  reproducing. 

"Above  all  things  a  spiritual,  and  yet  .a  simply 
practical  man.  Not  tall,  squarely  built,  hard-headed, 
well  bodied,  and  well  set  up,  he  is  obviously  a  bona 
fide  working  man.  His  head  is  of  the  'high  moral'  type, 

90 


STANDING  ALONE 

with  a  finely  developed  forehead,  denoting  perception 
and  reason  of  the  kind  called  common  sense/  His  brown 
hair  is  worn  long  and  curling  somewhat  like  the  'glory' 
round  the  head  of  a  saint  in  a  painted  window,  and  he 
goes  unshaved.  However,  most  readers  will  have  seen 
him  for  themselves  on  some  platform  or  another,  though 
one  needs  to  be  near  him  to  perceive  the  particularly 
deep,  straight  and  steady  gaze  of  the  clear  hazel  eyes, 
which  is  notable.  Altogether,  one  judges  him,  by 
appearances  only,  to  be  a  close-knit,  kindly  and  resolute 
man,  all  which  his  performance  in  life  bears  out." 

A  by-election  at  Attercliffe  in  July  calls  for  mention 
if  for  no  other  reason  than  that  it  signalises  J.  Ramsay 
MacDonald's  entrance  into  the  Independent  Labour 
Party.  The  circumstances  of  the  contest  confirmed  the 
I.L.P.  belief  that  the  interests  behind  Liberalism  would 
not  concede  willingly  a  single  inch  to  the  claims f  of 
labour  for  representation.  The  local  Trades  Council 
had  nominated  their  President,  Mr.  Charles  Hobson, 
with  the  tacit  understanding  that  he  would  be  allowed  a 
clear  field  to  fight  the  Tory.  Hobson  was  not  what  was 
called  an  extremist.  He  would  probably  have  been 
obedient  in  Parliament  to  the  Liberal  Whip,  but  the 
Liberals  were  taking  no  risks,  and  Mr.  Batty  Langley, 
a  local  employer  and  ex-mayor,  who  had,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  promised  to  support  Hobson,  was  nominated  as 
Liberal  candidate.  After  some  shilly-shallying  Hobson 
withdrew,  and  the  I.L.P.,  with  little  time  for  organisa- 
tion, determined  to  fight  with  Mr.  Frank  Smith  as  their 
candidate.  He  was  defeated,  of  course,  but  secured 
1,249  votes  as  against  7,984  for  the  two  reactionary 
candidates,  a  good  enough  foundation  for  the  victory 
which  was  to  come  later.  The  immediate  result  achieved 
was  the  clear  exposure  of  Liberalism's  hostility  to 
labour. 

91 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

The  following  letter  from  MacDonald  is  of  historical 
interest  to  the  members  of  the  I.L.P.,  and  is  to  some 
extent  illustrative  of  the  mental  attitude  of  both  the 
sender  and  the  recipient  :— 

"20  Duncan  Buildings, 

"Baldwin  Gardens,  E.G. 

"My  dear  Hardie, — I  am  now  making  personal 
application  for  membership  of  the  I.L.P.  I  have  stuck 
to  the  Liberals  up  to  now,  hoping  that  they  might  do 
something  to  justify  the  trust  that  we  had  put  in  them. 
Attercliffe  came  as  a  rude  awakening,  and  I  felt  during 
that  contest  that  it  was  quite  impossible  for  me  to  main- 
tain my  position  as  a  Liberal  any  longer.  Calmer  con- 
sideration has  but  strengthened  that  conviction,  and  if 
you  now  care  to  accept  me  amongst  you  I  shall  do  what  I 
can  to  support  the  I.L.P. 

"Between  you  and  me  there  never  was  any  dispute  as 
to  objects.  What  I  could  not  quite  accept  was  your 
methods.  I  have  changed  my  opinion.  Liberalism,  and 
more  particularly  local  Liberal  Associations,  have 
definitely  declared  against  Labour,  and  so  I  must  accept 
the  facts  of  the  situation  and  candidly  admit  that  the 
prophecies  of  the  I.L.P.  relating  to  Liberalism  have 
been  amply  justified.  The  time  for  conciliation  has 
gone  by  and  those  of  us  who  are  earnest  in  our  profes- 
sions must  definitely  declare  ourselves.  I  may  say  that 
in  the  event  of  elections,  I  shall  place  part  of  my  spare 
time  at  the  disposal  of  the  Party,  to  do  what  work  may 
seem  good  to  you. 

'  Yours  very  sincerely, 

"J.  R.  MACDONALD." 

In  this  manner  came  into  the  I.L.P.  one  whom  Hardie 
afterwards  characterised  as  its  "greatest  intellectual 

92 


STANDING  ALONE 

asset,"  and  whose  influence  on  national  and  international 
politics  has  been  very  great  and  still  continues. 

Meanwhile,  the  industrial  phase  of  the  Labour  con- 
flict absorbed  Hardie's  attention  even  more  than  the 
political.  The  great  strike  of  Scottish  miners  continued 
for  sixteen  weeks,  entailing  much  suffering  throughout 
the  mining  community  and  ending  in  virtual  defeat  for 
the  men.  Still,  though  this  was  foreseen  almost  from 
the  beginning,  it  was  necessary  that  the  stand  should  be 
made  for  the  safeguarding  of  the  sense  of  unity  which 
had  now  evolved  in  Scotland.  The  strike  was  in  some 
measure  a  consummation  of  Hardie's  early  efforts  on 
behalf  of  a  national  organisation.  It  was  not  a  sectional 
strike,  but  national,  embracing  the  whole  of  the  Scottish 
mining  industry,  and  in  that  respect  constituted  a  notable 
step  towards  that  all-British  combination  which  to-day 
enables  the  miners  from  Scotland  to  Cornwall  to  present 
a  united  front  for  the  advancement  of  their  common 
interests.  The  West  of  Scotland  leadership  was  now 
in  the  capable  hands  of  Robert  Smillie,  but,  naturally, 
when  at  home  during  the  Parliamentary  recess,  Hardie 
gave  all  possible  assistance  and  addressed  many  meet- 
ings of  the  men  in  Ayrshire  and  Lanarkshire,  besides 
giving  what  counsel  and  support  he  could  through  the 
"  Labour  Leader." 

When  it  was  all  over  he  drove  home  the  Socialist 
lesson  in  an  article  which,  by  reason  of  its  date,  October 
2oth,  1894,  is  a  complete  answer  to  those  who  now  regard 
the  claim  for  the  nationalisation  of  the  mines  as  a  new 
revolutionary  demand.  Revolutionary  it  may  be,  but 
it  is  not  new. 

"Now,  why,"  he  asked,  "were  the  masters,  the 
Government,  the  press  and  the  pulpit  all  arrayed 
against  you  ? 

'There  is  but  one  answer.    All  these  are  controlled  by 

93 


J.   KEIR  HARDIE 

the  rich  and  you  are  the  poor.  Take  the  miners.  The 
minerals  are  owned  by  the  landlords,  and  they  insist 
on  having  a  royalty  of  from  eightpence  to  one  shilling 
per  ton  of  coal  brought  to  the  surface.  The  pits  are 
owned  by  the  mineowners,  and  they  and  the  landlords 
have  the  power  to  say  that  not  one  ton  of  coal  shall 
be  dug  except  on  the  terms  they  are  willing  to  grant. 
Here  are  the  people  of  Scotland — over  four  million 
of  them,  wanting  coal  to  burn,  and  willing  to  pay  for  it. 
Here  are  you,  the  miners  of  Scotland,  seventy  thousand 
of  you,  willing  to  dig  the  coal  in  exchange  for  a  living 
wage.  But  between  you  and  the  public  stand  the  land- 
lords and  the  mineowners,  who  say :  'The  coal  is  ours 
and  we  won't  allow  the  miners  to  work  nor  the  public 
to  be  supplied  unless  on  our  terms.'  So  long  as  the 
landlords  and  the  mineowners  own  the  mines  they 
are  within  their  rights  when  they  act  as  they  have  been 
doing,  and  the  cure  lies  not  in  cursing  the  mine- 
j  /  owners  nor  in  striking,  but  in  making  the  mines  public 
J  property:' 

It  should  be  noted  that  it  was  only  before  or  after 
a  strike,  not  while  it  was  taking  place,  that  Hardie  asked 
the  men  to  listen  to  counsel  of  this  kind.  He  knew  that 
in  the  fight  for  wages,  a  strike,  or  the!  threat  of  a  strike, 
was  the  only  available  weapon,  and  in  the  use  of  it  he 
was  with  them  every  time.  He  knew  that  they  must  fight 
for  wages,  but  he  wanted  them  to  have  something  bigger 
than  wages  to  fight  for,  and  a  different  weapon  than 
the  strike. 

In  September  the  Trades  Union  Congress  was  held 
at  Norwich,  and  Hardie  attended  practically  for  the  last 
time  as  a  delegate.  He  had  some  time  previously  relin- 
quished all  official  positions  in  the  Miners'  Association 
and  was  therefore  disqualified  by  the  new  standing 
order  passed  this  year  which  declared  that  a  delegate 

94 


STANDING  ALONE 

must  be  either  workingf  at  his  trade  or  be  a  paid  official 
of  a  Trade  Union.  And  so  passed  from  the  Trades 
Union  Congress  three  men  who  had  taken  a  prominent 
part  in  its  deliberations — Keir  Hardie,  John  Burns  and 
Henry  Broadhurst.  Hardie  especially  had  left  his 
mark  on  the  Congress.  His  connection  with  the  Con- 
gress had  only  existed  over  a  period  of  eight  years, 
beginning  in  1887,  when  the  formation  of  the  Ayrshire 
Miners'  Union  gave  him  a  standing  as  a  delegate. 
In  that  time  the  outlook  of  the  Congress  towards  the 
principle  of  Independent  Labour  Representation,  and 
also  towards  Socialism,  had  almost  completely  changed. 
That  Hardie's  personality  had  much  to  do  with  that 
change  is  beyond  doubt. 

As  far  back  as  1869  the  Congress  had  declared  in 
favour  of  Labour  Representation  and  had  reaffirmed 
the  principle  on  several  subsequent  occasions.  But  no 
steps  had  ever  been  taken  to  give  practical  effect  to  the 
logical  electoral  policy  implied  by  such  resolutions — 
unless  the  return  of  a  few  working  men  to  Parliament 
as  adherents  of  the  Liberal  Party  could  be  so  regarded. 
Most  of  the  men  who  had  been  so  returned  were  mem- 
bers of  the  Congress.  Mr^JBroadhurst,  the  Secretary 
of  the  Parliamentary  Committee,  hacTmdeed  accepted 
office  in  the  Government  as  Under-Secretary  of  the 
Home  Office,  and  he  has  himself  stated  in  his  auto- 
biography that  the  Parliamentary  Committee  functioned 
as  the  Radical  wing  of  the  Liberal  Party.  He  had 
voted  in  Parliament  against  the  Miners'  Eight  Hours' 
Day  Bill,  and  in  all  election  campaigns  he  was  the 
Liberal  Party's  chief  platform  asset  wherever  working- 
class  votes  required  to  be  influenced.  Naturally,  he 
and  his  Liberal-Labour  colleagues  resented  vigorously 
the  new  policy  of  absolute  political  independence,  of 
which  Hardie  made  himself  the  spokesman.  Doubtless 

95 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

they  represented  quite  faithfully  the  general  Trade 
Union  attitude  on  the  question.  To  change  that  atti- 
tude was  the  purpose  of  Hardie  and  the  new  men  who 
were  pushing  their  way  into  the  Labour  movement. 

At  first  Hardie's  position  was  that  of  almost  complete 
isolation,  as  the  votes  of  the  Congress  testify.  At  the 
1888  Congress,  his  motion  impeaching  Broadhurst  for 
having  "in  the  name  of  the  Congress"  voted  against 
the  Miners'  Eight  Hours'  Day  Bill  received  only  15 
votes  against  80,  while  the  following  year  at  Dundee, 
when  he  made  a  frontal  attack  and  moved  that  Broad- 
hurst  "was  not  a  fit  and  proper  person  to  hold  the  office 
of  Secretary"  and  accused  him  of  supporting  employers 
of  labour  and  holding  shares  in  sweating  companies  (a 
charge  which  was  not  denied),  he  was  defeated  by 
177  to  ii. 

The  Congress  and  the  Trade  Union  movement  were 
evidently  overwhelmingly  against  him.  A  weaker  man 
would  have  accepted  defeat  of  this  kind  as  final.  It 
only  made  Hardie  more  stubborn  and  stimulated  him 
to  greater  effort.  Hardie's  Congress  record  is  some- 
thing of  a  paradox.  He  was  being  defeated  all  the  time, 
and  all  the  time  he  was  winning.  Even  in  1891,  when 
he  got  only  eleven  supporters  to  his  proposal  for  a 
Trade  Union  Parliamentary  Fund  for  securing  Parlia- 
mentary representation  that  was  a  move  forward,  being 
an  attempt  to  give  practical  effect  to  the  decision  which 
the  Congress  had  just  previously  arrived  at  calling  for 
a  "strong  and  vigorous  Labour  Party"  in  Parliament. 
Hardie's  amendment  was  as  follows  :  "and  would  sug- 
gest to  the  organised  trades  of  this  country  so  to  alter 
their  rules  as  to  admit  of  their  subscribing  to  a  Parlia- 
mentary Fund  to  be  placed  at  the  disposal  of  the 
Congress  to  secure  Labour  Representation  based  upon 
the  decision  of  this  Congress."  We  have  here  the  germ 

96 


STANDING  ALONE 

of  present  day  Labour  Party  finance.  Yet,  in  1891,  it 
had  only  eleven  supporters  in  the  Trades  Union  Con- 
gress. Similarly,  when,  in  1892,  on  the  motion  of 
Ben  Tillett,  it  was  decided  to  recommend  the  formation 
of  a  Parliamentary  Fund,  and  also  to  give  no  support 
to  any  candidates  but  those  who  stood  for  the  "collective 
ownership  of  the  means  of  production,  distribution  and 
exchange,"  Hardie  was  again  to  the  fore  with  an  amend- 
ment which  placed  him  once  more  in  the  minority.  His 
proposal  was  for  the  formation  of  an  Independent 
Parliamentary  group,  but  it  was  defeated  by  1 19  votes  to 
96.  Hardie's  minorities  were  always  the  heralds  of 
future  victory. 

At  that  same  Congress  he  had  gathered  together  the 
elements  out  of  which  in  the  following  year  was  evolved 
the  Independent  Labour  Party,  and  now,  this  year,  with 
the  I.L.P.  in  being,  and  himself  in  Parliament  as  its 
representative,  he  could  take  leave  of  the  Trades  Union 
Congress  assured  that  his  eight  years  of  struggle  and 
pioneering  had  not  been  in  vain. 

It  was  probably  on  the  occasion  of  this  visit  to 
Norwich  that  an  incident  occurred  revealing  to  his  Trade 
Union  friends  another  aspect  of  his  nature  than  that 
to  which  they  were  accustomed  in  the  stress  of  industrial 
and  political  strife.  The  incident  is  related  by  Mr.  S. 
G.  Hobson.  "Of  my  various  pleasant  memories  of 
Norwich,"  says  Mr.  Hobson,  "perhaps  the  sweetest  was 
one  evening  in  the  Cathedral  grounds  under  an  old 
Norman  arch  where  we  stood  and  watched  the  sun  go 
down  and  darkness  creep  silently  upon  us.  The  green- 
sward— smoothed  by  careful  hands  for  centuries  back — 
seemed  to  gradually  recede  from  our  view.  By  and  by 
the  lights  twinkled  from  many  windows,  and  we  knew 
that  worshippers  were  there  to  chant  the  evening  service 
and  sing  their  vesper  hymns.  Suddenly  the  voice  of 

97 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

old  Hardie  rose  through  the  stillness,  giving  vocal 
expression  to  the  Twenty-third  Psalm,  and  we  all 
joined — Christians  and  agnostics — blending  our  voices, 
not  so  much  in  any  devotional  spirit  as  out  of  deference 
to  the  influence  of  the  place." 

This  inherent  spiritual  emotionalism — if  it  may  be  so 
called — was  continually  manifesting  itself  in  various 
ways  all  through  life,  whether,  as  in  the  early  Ayrshire 
days,  in  evangelising  on  the  Ayrshire  highways  and  by- 
ways, or,  as  in  later  days,  preaching  in  Methodist  pulpits 
or  on  Brotherhood  platforms,  or  in  association  with  the 
votaries  of  spiritualism  and  theosophy.  He  was 
imbued  with  an  imaginative  catholicity  of  spirit  which 
rendered  him  responsive  to  every  expression  of  religious 
feeling  which  seemed  to  him  sincere.  There  is  no  need 
to  try  to  explain  it.  It  was  involuntary,  a  part  of  his 
nature,  and  it  never  hindered,  but  rather  intensified  and 
idealised,  his  work  for  Socialism.  His  spiritual 
enthusiasm  never  led  him  out  of  touch  with  reality.  In 
a  very  literal  sense,  "the  poor  he  had  always  with  him." 
He  was  one  of  them.  And  to  him  their  cause  was  a 
cause  of  the  devotional  spirit. 

Just  about  this  time  he  was  penning  his  letter  to  the 
Scottish  miners  which  was  afterwards  circulated  in 
pamphlet  form  under  the  title  of  "Collier  Laddies."  We 
find  him  also  addressing  propaganda  meetings  as  far 
north  as  Arbroath,  and  across  the  channel  speaking  in 
Waterford  and  in  the  Rotunda  at  Dublin  and  reporting 
upon  the  Labour  movement  in  Ireland  with  an  optimism 
which  can  hardly  have  been  based  upon  an  accurate 
estimate  of  the  all-absorbent  character  of  the  Nationalist 
movement  in  that  country. 

Towards  the  end  of  this  year,  the  I.L.P.  had  an  acces- 
sion of  a  kind  more  valuable  than  it  could  then  know. 
Philip  Snowden,  a  man  quite  unknown  to  public  life, 


STANDING  ALONE 

joined  the  I.L.P.  He  had  been  living  quietly  in  a  remote 
village  amongst  the  Yorkshire  hills,  recovering  from  a 
very  serious,  illness,  and  in  the  period  of  convalescence 
had  given  his  mind  to  a  study  of  social  problems,  which 
ended  in  his  becoming  a  convinced  Socialist.  The 
I.L.P.  was  steadily  becoming  equipped  with  capable 
leadership,  and  with  men  of  experience  in  administrative/ 
work.  Keir  Hardie,  Ramsay  MacDonald,  Philip  Snow- 
den,  Bruce  Glasier,  Fred  Jowett,  to  name  no  others, 
constituted  a  group  which  for  all-round  ability  on  the 
platform  or  in  the  council  chamber  could  not  be  sur- 
passed by  any  of  the  other  political  parties. 

In  the  Liberal  camp  there  were  evident  signs  of  alarm 
at  the  activities  of  the  new  party.  In  July,  following 
close  upon  the  Attercliffe  election,  Joseph  Burgess  had 
polled  a  substantial  vote  in  a  by-election  at  Leicester, 
and  all  over  the  country  the  I.L.P.  was  busy  selecting 
its  candidates  and  choosing  the  constituencies  in  which 
it  would  fight,  many  of  these  being  places  where  the 
Liberal  hold  was  already  somewhat  precarious.  Lord 
Rosebery,  now  Prime  Minister,  found  it  expedient  to 
address  a  meeting  in  Hardie's  constituency  at  which  he 
demonstrated  to  his  own  satisfaction  that  a  united 
democracy  was  only  possible  through  the  Liberal  Party. 
Hardie,  characteristically,  replied  both  by  speech  and 
pen,  thereby  focussing  more  than  ever,  national  atten- 
tion on  himself  as  a  political  personality,  and  an  article 
which  he  contributed  to  the  January,  1895,  "Nineteenth 
Century"  explaining  and  vindicating  the  I.L.P.  policy 
and  tactics,  attracted  much  attention. 

Nor  did  his  practical  work  in  the  House  of  Commons 
go  entirely  without  recognition.  On  January  i9th, 
for  example,  he  was  the  guest  of  the  Fawcett  Associa- 
tion, at  that  time  the  one  body  ventilating  the  grievances 
of  postal  servants,  and  was  presented  with  an  illuminated 

99 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

address,  "for  the  valuable  services  you  have  rendered 
us  in  the  House  of  Commons  on  every  occasion  when 
you  have  found  it  possible  to  effectually  advocate  our 
cause/'  The  address  concluded  :  "We  thank  you  for 
your  resolute  adherence  to  the  cause  of  truth  and  justice, 
and  esteem  you  as  a  man  whose  promise  may  be  relied 
on."  An  extremely  comforting  assurance  to  a  man  who 
was  at  that  very  time  being  more  virulently  assailed  by 
the  party  politicians  than  any  other  public  man  in  the 
country. 

Hardie  was  now  preparing  for  his  third  Parliamentary 
session  and  was  determined  to  go  to  Westminster  this 
time  fortified  by  an  outside  agitation  which  would  com- 
pel the  Government  to  act  on  behalf  of  the  unemployed, 
or  to  resign,  a  formidable  objective  for  an  apparently 
solitary  and  friendless  commoner.  The  distress 
throughout  the  country,  instead  of  lessening,  was 
becoming  more  acute  and  widespread.  Well-intentioned 
local  distress  committees  and  soup  kitchens  only 
emphasised,  without  materially  alleviating,  the  misery, 
and  although  the  contending  politicians  might  make 
platform  play  with  Armenian  atrocities  and  with  their 
rival  plans  for  pacifying  Ireland,  it  was  not  possible  to 
get  hungry  British  electors  to  concentrate  on  either  of 
these  questions  as  an  election  issue.  The  difficulty 
was — and  is — to  get  them  to  concentrate  upon  anything. 
That,  in  fact,  is  the  trouble  with  which  the  Labour 
Party  is  still  faced. 

In  the  first  week  of  January,  he  appealed  through  the 
4  *  Labour  Leader "  for  a  small  fund  with  which  to  begin 
a  national  unemployed  agitation,  and  by  the  time  Parlia- 
ment met  in  February,  with  a  comparatively  trifling 
expenditure  of  money,  big  demonstrations  had  been  held 
in  many  of  the  great  industrial  centres,  Hardie  himself 
taking  a  leading  part  in  most  of  them.  Many  of  the 

100 


Copyright 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE,  1893 


THE  UNEMPLOYED 

Liberal  Members,  with  a  general  election  impending, 
were  compelled  to  make  promises  to  their  constituents 
which  it  was  necessary  they  should  make  at  least  some 
pretence  of  redeeming.  It  was,  therefore,  with  some 
tremors  that  the  Government  faced  the  House  of  Com- 
mons, notwithstanding  Harcourt's  jocular  attempt  to 
make  light  of  the  Opposition  forces.  "There  was  no 
'true  blue'  now.  They  had  instead  the  faded  yellow  of 
Birmingham,  a  little  dash  of  green  from  Waterford,  and 
a  little  splotch  of  red  from  West  Ham. ' '  Thus — deliber- 
ately or  not — reckoning  the  solitary  Keir  Hardie  as  of 
equal  importance  with  the  great  Unionist  Party.  "A 
splotch  of  red"  said  one  of  the  clever  rhymers  of  the 
"Labour  Leader "  : — 

"A  splotch  of  red,  Sir  William  V., 
Only  a  little  splotch  of  red. 
Your  friends  sit  back  and  broadly  smile 
As  you  the  weary  hours  beguile 
With  little  jokes — but  time  will  be 
When  you'll  not  treat  so  jestingly 
That  tiny  little  splotch  of  red. 
A  hearty,  healthy  little  splotch 
And  growing-  fast;  full  firmly  bent 
On  turning  out  the  fools  that  sport 
With  simple  men  and  women's  woes, 
Your  office  is  your  only  thought, 
Your  friends  but  on  their  seats  intenlt. 
Think  you  it  can  be  ever  so? 
Sir  William  V.,  we  tell  you,  no; 
And  all  your  mocking  Parliament." 

Hardie' s  amendment  to  the  address  was  in  exactly 
the  same  terms  as  the  one  he  had  moved  two  years  before 
on  first  taking  his  seat,  but  the  circumstances  were  differ- 
ent. The  unemployed  agitation  had  assumed  big  pro- 
portions, the  pressure  from  the  constituencies  was  having 
considerable  effect  upon  many  of  the  Government  sup- 
porters who  would  be  compelled  to  vote  with  Hardie 

I  101 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

unless  their  own  leaders  could  provide  them  with  a 
plausible  alternative;  and  there  was  the  Tory  opposition, 
willing  to  use  the  unemployed  question,  or  any  other 
question,  as  a  means  of  bringing  about  a  Government 
defeat. 

Mr.  T.  P.  O'Connor,  himself  an  experienced  wire 
puller,  described  in  the  " Weekly  Sun"  the  manceuver- 
ings  which  took  place.  "Some  shrewd  friends  of  the 
Government  knew  what  was  in  store  for  them  if  they 
were  to  receive  the  motion  of  Mr.  Keir  Hardie  with  a 
blank  negative.  The  Government  accordingly  con- 
sidered the  situation,  with  the  result  that  they  went  care- 
fully through  the  suggestions  that  were  made  to  them  for 
meeting  with  this  terrible  difficulty  which  comes  periodic- 
ally athwart  the  opulence  and  comfort  of  this  mighty 
nation  and  this  vast  city.  The  information  was  conveyed 
to  the  friends  of  the  Government  that  they  saw  their  way 
to  propose  a  committee  which  would  get  a  very  practical 
bit  of  work  to  do,  and  which  would  be  obliged  to  go  into 
the  question  of  the  unemployed  promptly  as  well  as 
seriously.  Friends  of  the  Government,  having  con- 
sidered the  terms  of  what  it  was  proposed  to  do,  were 
able  to  announce  in  turn  to  the  Government  that  in  their 
opinion  this  was  as  much  as  could  be  expected,  and  so  all 
danger  of  defections  from  the  Liberal  ranks  disappeared. 
Whatever  happened  on  other  amendments,  Ministers 
were  safe  on  the  amendment  of  Mr.  Keir  Hardie" — 
safe,  but  considerably  shaken.  Hardie  had  proved 
himself  a  good  parliamentary  strategist;  but  he  was 
more  than  a  strategist.  He  was,  in  a  good  cause,  perhaps 
the  most  stubborn  man  alive.  He  persisted  with  his 
motion  notwithstanding  the  promised  concession,  in  the 
value  of  which  he  had  no  faith  at  all.  The  scene  which 
ensued  was  thus  described  by  a  Press  correspondent : — 

"As  soon  as  it  was  known  he  was  up,  Members  poured 

IO2 


THE  UNEMPLOYED 

in  from  every  part,  until  every  bench  had  its  full  quota 
of  Members,  whilst  a  crowd  stood  below  the  bar  and 
another  crowd  behind  the  Speaker's  chair.  Both  front 
benches  were  crowded  with  Ministers  and  ex-Ministers 
and  the  attention  of  the  House  was  kept  unbroken  from 
start  to  finish. 

4 'The  speech  was  not  of  the  fighting  order;  the  con- 
cession just  offered  by  the  Government  of  a  special  com- 
mittee having  made  that  impossible,  but  the  interest 
never  flagged  for  a  moment  and  the  chorus  of  cheers 
from  all  parts  at  the  close  showed  that  a  responsive  chord 
had  been  struck.  Sir  Charles  Dilke  followed  and  con- 
gratulated Mr.  Hardie  on  having  gained  the  point  which 
for  two  and  a  half  years  he  had  been  constantly  fighting 
for.  He  quoted  Mr.  Gladstone's  reply  to  a  question 
put  by  the  Member  for  West  Ham  in  1893,  in  which  the 
Prime  Minister  refused  to  agree  to  the  appointment  of 
a  committee  because  it  was  not  the  business  of  the 
Government  to  deal  with  such  questions." 

Another  contemporary  impression,  contributed  to  a 
Northern  paper,  preserves  for  us  with  remarkable  vivid- 
ness the  nature  of  the  ordeal  through  which  Hardie  had 
to  pass  when  opposing  the  Government  motion  : — • 

' 'When  the  Member  for  West  Ham  moved  his  second 
amendment,  Sir  William  Harcourt  appealed  to  him  to 
withdraw  it,  an  appeal  which  was  backed  by  Sir  John 
Gorst,  Mr.  J.  W.  Benn,  and  Sir  Albert  Rollit,  whilst 
a  number  of  Members  tried  their  influence  privately. 
'If  the  Government  can  find  the  committee  and  make 
an  interim  report,  I  will  withdraw  my  amendment5 ;  and 
the  knit  brow  and  the  firm  mouth  showed  that  the  words 
meant  what  they  said.  It  was  a  strange  and  significant 
scene  as  the  representatives  of  rank  and  titles  tried  to 
bend  the  shaggy  pitman  to  their  will.  In  the  end  he 
conquered,  and  the  cheers  with  which  Sir  William  Har- 

IP3 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

court's  capitulation  was  received  were  really  a  tribute 
to  Keir  Hardie's  firmness.  It  was  a  little  incident,  but 
of  great  significance.55 

The  * 'splotch  of  red"  had  made  an  indelible  mark. 
He  got  the  assurance  that  the  committee  would  get  to 
work  immediately  and  bring  in  an  interim  report  with  all 
possible  speed.  He,  for  his  own  part^llaying  little  faith 
in  a  committee  appointed  reluctantly  to  sfl^e  the  Govern- 
ment from  immediate  downfall,  refused  to  associate 
himself  with  it. 

And  now,  finally,  to  complete  the  picture,  take  this 
other  contemporary  comment  from  the  London  "Echo." 

"Possibly  the  new  Parliament  may  see  nothing  of 
Keir  Hardie,  but  the  chronologist  will  at  least  do  him 
the  justice  of  recording  how  he  threw  the  Government 
of  the  day  into  a  blue  funk,  forced  their  hand,  and  then 
haughtily  left  the  Chamber,  disdaining  with  almost  a 
refinement  of  cynicism  to  support  their  tardy  concession, 
and  at  the  same  time  deftly  eluding  the  grasp  of  the 
clever  intriguers  who  hoped  to  jockey  into  a  follower  the 
free  lance  whom  their  caste  pride  would  not  permit  to 
lead   them.    Verily,  the  game   of   party  politics   is   a 
truculent  business,  and  the  fact  has  never  been  more 
poignantly  illustrated  than  in  the  incidents  of  a  week  in 
which,  shocking  as  it  is,  the  almost  houseless  poor  have 
been  the  sport  of  the  strategists  in  'high  places.' 

In  this  fashion  did  Keir  Hardie  earn  the  title  of  ' 'Mem- 
ber for  the  Unemployed." 


104 


CHAPTER  SIX 

A   GENERAL  €^£CTION AMERICA INDUSTRIAL    STRIFE 

THE  Liberal  Government,  however,  though  saved 
for  the  time  being,  was,  through  sheer  incapacity 
to  retain  the  confidence  of  any  substantial  section 
of  public  opinion,  drifting  to  its  doom,  and  when,   at 
Easter,  1895,  the  Annual  Conference  of  the  I.L.P.  met 
in  Newcastle,  its  deliberations  were  influenced  to  some 
extent  by  the  knowledge  that  a  General  Election  was 
near  at  hand  and  that  the  Party  might  in  the  course  of 
a  few  weeks  have  to  make  its  first  trial  of  strength  at 
the  ballot  box. 

The  chief  subject  of  discussion  at  the  Conference  was, 
therefore,  on  questions  of  election  tactics  and  policy,  but 
the  decisions  arrived  at  involved  something  more  than 
a  question  of  merely  tentative  electioneering  expediency. 
They  determined  the  future  character  and  method  of  the 
I.L.P.  as  a  political  party  working  for  Socialism. 

First  of  all  there  was  the  proposal  to  change  the  name 
to  that  of  "National  Socialist  Party,"  a  proposal  which, 
if  it  had  been  adopted  when  proposed  by  George  Carson 
at  the  first  Conference,  would  doubtless  have  remained 
permanently.  Whether  it  would  have  excluded  any  un- 
desirable moderate  elements  from  the  Party  can  now  only 
be  conjectured,  but  after  two  years,  in  which,  under  the 
name  of  I.L.P.,  the  Party  had  established  itself  and  had 
become  familiar  to  the  British  public,  without  in  any 
way  compromising  its  Socialist  aim,  it  was  felt  by  the 
great  majority  that  a  change  was  unnecessary.  The 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Newcastle  Conference  therefore  confirmed  the  title  under 
which,  through  good  report  and  evil,  British  Socialism 
has  sought  to  utilise  the  political  power  of  British 
democracy.  Hardie  was  not  strongly  partial  either  way, 
and  would  have  continued  to  serve  under  any  Party 
name  which  embodied  the  Socialist  objective. 

Not  so,  however,  with  regard  to  the  other  and  more 
vital  proposal  to  introduce  into  the  Constitution  a  rigid 
pledge  binding  all  I.L.P.  members  "to  support  and  vote 
only  for  I.L.P.  and  S.D.F.  candidates  at  any  election." 
This  was  what  was  known  as  the  "Fourth  Clause,"  and 
round  it  was  waged  in  the  press,  on  the  platform  and 
in  branch  meetings,  many  a  wordy  conflict.       It  was 
mainly  because  of  the  rejection  of  this  clause  that  Robert 
Blatchford  left  the  I.L.P.       Under  this  proposal  the 
large  majority  of  I.L.P.   adherents  would  have  exer- 
cised no  vote  at  all  at  the  oncoming  General  Election. 
Some  twenty-one  candidates  had  already  been  chosen, 
and  others  were  in  course  of  selection,  but  in  upwards 
of  six  hundred  constituencies,  even  where  their  votes 
might  have  had  a  decisive  effect  as  between  Liberal  and 
Tory,  Socialists  under  this  pledge  would  be  condemned 
to  inaction.    Contingent  upon  this  proposal  was  the  other 
discussion  as  to  whether,  in  constituencies  where  there 
was  no  Socialist  candidate,  the  vote  should    be    given 
always  against  the  sitting  Member,  either  Liberal    or 
Tory,  the  object  being  to  demonstrate  the  power  of  the 
I.L.P.     This,  of  course,  was  an  impossible  policy  if  the 
abstinence  pledge  was  enforced.    Hardie  was  opposed  to 
the  rigidity  which  such  a    pledge    implied    for    other 
reasons.     He  had  an  intimate  knowledge  of  the  Trade 
Union  and  Co-operative  movements,  and  he  knew  well 
that  even  I.L.P.  sympathisers  within  these  movements 
could  not  be  expected,  where  possible  gain  to  Trade 
Unionism  or  Co-operation  was  obtainable,  to  exercise 

1 06 


GENERAL    ELECTION 

such  a  self-denying  political  ordinance.   To  issue  a  man- 
date which  would  not  be  obeyed  would  be  interpreted  as 
evidence  of  weakness  rather  than  of  strength,  and  in  his 
presidential  address,  without  any  direct  reference  to  the 
Conference  agenda,  he  appealed  to  the  members  to  do 
nothing  to  alienate  the  Trade  Union,  Co-operative  and 
Temperance  movements.    On  the  other  hand,  in  support 
of  the  clause  it  was  urged  by  Leonard  Hall  and  others, 
that  "what  was  wanted  was  a  fixed,  definite  and  per- 
manent policy  having  regard,  not  to  the  present  only, 
but  to  the  ultimate  triumph  for  which  they  were  working 
in  the  future."     This,  of  course,  was  the  very  object 
which  it  was  maintained  could  best  be  secured  by  the 
less  rigid  proposal  put  forward  by  the  National  Council. 
This  asked  from  members  the  following  declaration  : 
"I  hereby  declare  myself  a  Socialist,  pledge  myself  to 
sever  my  connection  with  any  other  political  party,  and 
to  vote  in  the  case  of  local  elections  as  my  branch  of  the 
I.L.P.  may  determine,  and,  in  the  case  of  the  Parlia- 
mentary elections,  as  the  Conference  specially  convened 
for  that  purpose  may  decide."    This  was  adopted  and  is 
still  the  election  policy  of  the  I.L.P.     Yet,  curiously 
enough,  at  the  very  first  election  the  Special  Party  Con- 
ference  recommended   the   "Fourth    Clause"   line   of 
action  and  inaction. 

The  opportunity  came  in  July.  The  Liberal  Govern- 
ment was  defeated  on  the  question  of  an  insufficient 
supply  of  explosive  material  for  the  Army — evidently 
a  more  serious  default  than  an  insufficiency  of  food 
or  work  for  the  unemployed.  The  I.L.P.  went  into  the 
contest  with  a  manifesto  to  the  electors  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland,  the  following  extract  from  which  shows  the 
electoral  policy  advised,  but  certainly  not  adopted,  by 
Socialist  voters  : — 

"The  I.L.P.  has  for  its  object  not  merely  the  return 

107 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

of  working  men  to  Parliament,  but  the  entire  reorgan- 
isation of  our  system  of  wealth  production  on  the  basis 
of  an  industrial  Commonwealth.  To  accomplish  this  we 
aim  at  breaking  down  the  system  of  party  government 
which  is  responsible  for  dividing  the  great  mass  of  the 
people  into  separate  camps,  so  evenly  balanced  that  the 
one  neutralises  the  other,  and  thus  reduces  the  franchise 
to  a  mockery.  So  long  as  we  continue  to  vote  for 
Liberals  and  Conservatives,  the  mockery  of  government, 
of  which  we  have  seen  so  much,  will  continue. 

"In  twenty-nine  constituencies  I.L.P.  candidates  will 
go  to  the  poll,  and  the  Party  has  decided  at  a  special 
conference  of  delegates  from  all  parts  of  the  country  that 
in  all  other  constituencies  the  members  shall  ABSTAIN 
FROM  VOTING.  For  this  election  we  consider  this 
the  most  effective  method  of  achieving  our  object." 

The  result  showed  that  the  workers  in  most  constitu- 
encies where  there  were  no  Labour  candidates  did  not 
act  upon  this  advice.  They  exercised  the  franchise  and 
voted  against  the  Liberal  Party,  which,  through  a  long 
period  of  deep  distress,  had  proved  itself  callous  to  the 
claims  of  the  unemployed.  The  Liberal  Party  was 
badly  routed.  Some  of  its  leading  men,  such  as  Mr. 
John  Morley  and  Sir  William  Vernon  Harcourt,  were 
cast  out,  chiefly  through  the  intervention  of  I.L.P.  can- 
didates; but  in  the  main  the  verdict  against  Liberalism 
was  an  expression  of  discontent  with  the  Party  rather  than 
of  revolt  against  the  system  which  the  Party  represented. 
The  Socialist  propaganda  had  not  vet  penetrated  deeply 
enough,  and  especially,  it  had  not  been  able  to  make  the 
Irish  population  in  the  constituencies  subordinate  their 
Nationalist  aspirations  to  their  economic  needs.  It  was 
the  Irish  vote  in  this  election  which  saved  the  Liberal 
Party  from  utter  ruin.  And  it  was  the  Irish  vote  that 
defeated  Keir  Hardie  in  West  Ham  and  returned  a  Tory 

1 08 


GENERAL    ELECTION 

who  had  not  the  faintest  sympathy  with  Home  Rule,  the 
official  Liberals,  by  countenancing  such  tactics,  making 
it  clear  that  to  them  Keir  Hardie  was  a  more  dangerous 
adversary  than  any  Tory.  A  very  high  compliment 
indeed,  and  one  that  confirmed  the  I.L.P.  contention 
that  there  was  no  fundamental  difference  between 
Liberalism  and  Conservatism. 

The  Socialists,  though  not  one  of  their  candidates 
was  returned  and  they  lost  their  single  Parliamentary 
seat,  showed  not  the  slightest  sign  of  dejection.  They 
were,  indeed,  jubilant.  They  reckoned  up  their  votes  and 
found  that  they  had  polled  an  average  of  1,592  votes  per 
candidate.  They  believed  that  a  proportionate  support 
was  waiting  for  them  in  most  of  the  other  constituencies 
where  they  had  been  unable  to  put  up  candidates,  and 
they  knew  that  with  these  votes  they  could  win  Local 
Government  seats  in  every  part  of  the  country. 

Hardie  wrote  a  farewell  letter  to  the  West  Ham 
electors,  concluding  in  his  usual  optimistic  vein  :  "The 
moral  and  intellectual  power  of  the  community  are  on 
our  side  and  those  in  the  end  will  triumph.  I  thank  my 
friends  for  the  zeal  with  which  they  worked.  The 
triumph  of  our  movement  has  not  been  delayed;  we  have 
but  purified  it  by  purging  it  of  unworthy  elements.  Let 
the  friends  of  our  cause  be  of  good  cheer."  So  ended 
Keir  Hardie's  third  year's  experiment  as  a  lone  fighter 
in  Parliament. 

There  is  another  aspect  of  this  Parliamentary  struggle 
which  should  not  be  lost  sight  of  in  forming  our  estimate 
of  the  character  of  this  man.  There  was  no  wages'  fund 
from  which  he  could  draw  an  income.  He  was  not  the 
paid  servant  of  any  trade  union.  Payment  of  Members 
was  still  far  in  the  future.  During  these  three  years,  as 
always,  he  had  to  earn  his  own  living  and  maintain  his 
home  in  Cumnock.  That  he,  the  self-taught  man  from 

109 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  pits,  untutored  and  untrained  except  in  the  rough 
school  of  perpetual  industrial  strife,  should  have  been 
able  to  do  this  without  the  slightest  sacrifice  of  principle, 
is  proof  of  great  capacity  and  indomitable  spirit.  It 
was  the  recognition  of  this  that  won  for  him  the  respect 
of  the  better  section  of  his  opponents,  and  the  trust  and 
affection  of  his  colleagues  and  comrades  in  the  move- 
ment of  which  he  was  now  the  acknowledged  leader. 
Doubtless,  during  these  years  there  were  times  when 
it  was  well-nigh  impossible  to  make  ends  meet,  either  in 
London  or  in  Cumnock,  but  of  these  things  neither  he 
nor  the  good  wife  at  home  ever  made  mention. 

Release  from  Parliament  brought  the  opportunity  to 
realise  a  long-cherished  desire.  In  the  autumn  of  the 
previous  year  he  had  made  plans  to  visit  America,  and 
had  actually  booked  his  passage,  but  at  the  last  moment 
certain  unexplained  obstacles  intervened — probably 
financial —  and  the  project  had  to  be  abandoned. 

Now  there  came  an  invitation  from  the  American 
Labour  Day  Committee  to  attend  the  Chicago  Labour 
Congress  on  September  2nd.  The  Chicago  Labour 
Congress  was  described  by  H.  D.  Lloyd  (who  also  wrote 
pressing  Hardie  to  accept)  as  "composed  of  the  best 
elements  of  the  Trade  Union  movement  of  Chicago," 
and  it  was  urged  that  Hardie's  visit  would  be  "a  matter 
of  national — and  international — importance."  He  had 
some  hesitation  in  accepting  the  invitation,  due  to  the 
fact  that  Mrs.  Hardie  had  been  for  some  time  in  rather 
poor  health.  She  had,  however,  recovered  considerably, 
and,  said  Hardie,  "she,  with  that  devotion  to  the  cause 
which  had  enabled  her  to  endure  so  much  uncomplain- 
ingly in  the  past,  sank  herself  once  more."  He  regarded 
the  American  expedition  as  part  of  a  much  bigger  pro- 
ject. "Next  year,"  he  said,  "I  hope  to  visit  Australia 
or  New  Zealand  and  thus  get  the  entire  advanced 

no 


AMERICA 

Labour  movement  into  active  speaking  contact,"  a  plan 
which  he  ultimately  fulfilled,  though  not  in,  the  chrono- 
logical order  here  indicated.  In  addition  to  this  high 
seriousness  of  purpose,  Hardie  undoubtedly  expected 
much  personal  enjoyment  from  the  Transatlantic 
excursion.  He  made  his  preparations  with  almost 
boyish  zest  and  enthusiasm,  and  revelled  humorously 
in  the  kindly  arrangements  for  his  comfort  made  by 
numerous  friends  and  comrades.  He  relates  with  great 
gusto  how  one  friend  sent  him  a  cigarette  case,  how 
another  brought  him  a  cigar  case,  and  yet  another  a  box 
of  cigars  wherewith  to  keep  it  filled ;  a  fourth  brought  a 
packet  of  "Old  Gold"  and  a  pipe,  and  a  fifth,  "the 
widow's  mite,  in  the  shape  of  a  matchbox  made  by  him- 
self"— a  monotonous  succession  of  gifts,  due,  as 
Hardie  whimsically  said,  to  the  fact  that  he  had  "only 
one  vice,"  characterised  by  one  of  his  friends  as  an  ability 
"to  smoke  anything  from  a  cuttypipe  to  a  factory  chim- 
ney." "At  least,  I  shall  have  plenty  of  tobacco  for  the 
next  seven  days." 

He  celebrated  his  thirty-seventh  birthday  quietly  at 
Cumnock,  and  next  morning  started  off  on  his  travels. 

At  Liverpool,  the  port  of  departure,  he  was  joined 
by  Mr.  Frank  Smith,  who  was  to  be  his  companion  and 
confidant  in  this  and  many  other  enterprises.  Mr.  Smith 
had  come  into  the  Socialist  movement  by  way  of  the 
Salvation  Army,  of  the  social  work  of  which  he  had  been 
one  of  the  principal  organisers,  until  the  futility  of 
patching  up  an  ever-extending  evil  had  driven  him  to 
look  for  a  fundamental  cure,  and  naturally  brought  him 
to  Socialism.  Right  up  to  the  end  Hardie  and  he  were 
very  close  friends. 

The  Merseyside  Socialists  organised  a  great  send-off 
demonstration,  and,  not  content  with  marching  in  pro- 
cession to  the  quayside,  chartered  a  tug  on  board  of 

ill 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

which  a  crowd  of  enthusiasts  attended  the  Cunard  liner 
right  out  of  the  harbour  bar,  cheering  and  singing  in  a 
way,  as  Hardie  said,  "calculated  to  make  every  passen- 
ger on  the  'Campania'  discuss  Socialism." 

The  immediate  result  was  an  invitation  to  address 
the  passengers  on  the  subject  of  "Competition,"  this 
title  having  been  suggested  by  the  denunciatory  ban- 
ners displayed  from  the  tug.  This  was  the  kind  of 
request  which  Hardie  never  refused.  Probably  no  man 
has  ever  spoken  for  Socialism  in  so  great  a  variety  of 
circumstances.  The  hillside  or  the  street  corner,  the 
church  pulpit  or  the  university  debating  hall,  made  no 
difference  to  him ;  he  'delivered  his  message  with  as 
much  emphasis  and  impressiveness  to  students  and  pro- 
fessors and  aristocrats  and  millionaires  as  to  colliers 
and  dock  labourers  and  common  working  folk. 

On  this  occasion  he  drew  his  illustrations  of  the  social 
and  industrial  world  from  the  classes  into  which  the 
passengers  were  divided — the  privileged  class,  the 
plutocrats,  and  the  common  people — and  showed  "how 
the  two  former  were  sitting  on  the  backs  and  keeping 
their  hands  in  the  pockets  of  the  latter,  robbing  them  of 
the  land,  robbing  them  of  the  fruits  of  their  labour,  and 
all  in  the  name  of  the  law  and  by  the  means  of  com- 
petition, and  so  keeping  the  workers  in  subjection." 
Needless  to  say,  the  two  I.L.P.  men  and  the  steerage 
folk  enjoyed  themselves,  and  probably  some  of  the 
"plutocrats"  also. 

One  personal  note  of  the  voyage  may  be  preserved 
as  characteristic.  The  other  passengers  were  in  the 
habit  of  putting  back  their  watches  an  hour  each  day, 
so  as  to  be  right  with  New  York  time  on  arrival.  Not 
so  Hardie.  "With  that  sympathy  with  Toryism  which 
I  am  known  to  possess,  I  declined  to  alter  my  time. 
By  keeping  to  the  Cumnock  time  I  could  always  tell 

112 


AMERICA 

exactly  what  was  being  done  at  home — when  the 
children  went  to  school,  when  they  returned,  when 
they  went  to  bed,  and  the  rest  of  it — and  found 
more  to  interest  me  therein  than  in  trying  to  keep 
pace  with  Daddy  Time." 

The  two  companions  contributed  to  the  "Labour 
Leader"  at  the  time  a  series  of  intensely  interesting 
descriptive  articles,  which  even  now  might  bear  repro- 
duction in  book  form,  alike  as  an  extra  biographical 
memento,  and  as  a  means  of  comparing  American  labour 
conditions  of  that  time  with  the  present.  For  Hardie 
it  was  a  memorable  pilgrimage. 

His  was  the  kind  of  mind  that  never  becomes  blase 
or  impervious  to  new  sensations.  Every  day,  almost 
every  hour,  of  his  journeying  brought  something  of  the 
thrill  of  a  new  adventure.  At  New  York  he  was  most 
cordially  welcomed  and  feted  by  all  sections  of  the 
Socialist  and  Labour  movement,  who  sank  their  differ- 
ences in  order  to  do  honour  to  the  fearless  agitator  from 
across  the  "fish  pond."  He  visited  Daniel  de  Leon, 
at  that  time  editor  of  "The  People,"  whom  he  describes 
as  "a  fair  specimen  of  the  energetic,  clear,  cool  enthusi- 
ast. Seen  in  the  editor's  den  at  184  Market  Street,  he 
recalls  the  pictures  one  has  seen  of  the  French  Com- 
munists manning  the  barricades,  in  his  striped  blouse, 
white  kerchief  at  the  throat,  slightly  oval  face,  with  full 
beard  growing  grey,  and  the  clear  eye  and  olive-tinted 
skin  of  the  South.  A  man  accustomed  to  give  and  receive 
hard  knocks,  he  has  enemies  as  well  as  friends,  but  all 
agree  that  for  single-mindedness  and  purity  of  aim  he 
has  few  equals. " 

In  New  York,  and  through  his  fifteen  weeks'  tour, 
Hardie  noted  regretfully  the  keen,  almost  fierce  antag- 
onism between  the  various  sections  of  the  Labour  and 
Socialist  movement,  but  was  gratified  to  find  their 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

antagonisms  fade  away,  at  least  temporarily,  in  the  com- 
mon desire  to  show  him  respect  and  give  him  a  "good 
time."  The  travellers  were  nearly  a  week  in  New  York 
before  starting  West.  They  spent  daylight  hours  in 
the  "Bowery,"  and  night-time  hours  in  China  Town. 
They  contrasted  the  vaunted  Yankee  equality  with  the 
rigidity  of  the  "colour  line."  They  were  the  guests  of 
the  select  Manhattan  Club,  whose  members  viewed  with 
disapproval  alike  the  political  opinions  of  their  visitors 
and  their  preference  for  ginger  ale  to  burgundy.  They 
dined  at  Delmonico's  where  pipes  were  taboo  and  cigars 
the  only  permissible  smoke,  and  they  mingled  with  the 
early-morning  line  of  hungry  men  waiting  for  a  free 
distribution  of  bread  outside  the  Vienna  Bakery.  They 
penetrated  as  far  as  they  dared  into  the  social  under- 
world, and,  as  their  motives  were  higher  than  mere 
curiosity,  they  doubtless  succeeded  better  than  most 
sightseers. 

The  writer  has  thought  it  well,  during  the  course  of  this 
narrative,  to  present  Hardie  as  he  appeared  to  some  of 
his  contemporaries.  This  "New  York  World"  picture 
of  him  may  not  come  amiss  : 

'  'As  a  representative  of  the  great  class  he  is  undoubt- 
edly more  interesting  than  anything  he  may  say.  He  is 
a  strong  man.  His  face  is  strong  and  his  jaw  is  square; 
his  head  is  big  and  well  shaped.  His  hair  is  fairly  long 
and  curly.  He  is  intensely  earnest.  He  has  no  non- 
sense about  him  and  no  cant.  He  uses  words  to  express 
what  he  thinks,  not  to  sound  well.  He  dresses  simply, 
perhaps  too  simply,  for  there  is  as  much  affectation  in 
simplicity  as  in  show.  His  shoes  are  low-cut  and  heavy, 
and  his  blue  shirt  and  tie  match  and  are  sensible.  His 
nose  is  straight  and  long.  He  has  a  good  eye  which 
looks  squarely  at  and  into  you.  His  chest  is  big.  He  is 
temperate.  He  has  read  more  than  the  average  ignor- 

114 


AMERICA 

amus  who  will  try  to  teach  him  about  American  institu- 
tions. He  knows  what  few  men  who  try  original  thought 
ever  learn.  He  knows  that  he  can  never  hope  to  learn 
much  or  to  do  much.  He  realises  that  he  is  like  a  small 
insect  working  at  the  foundations  of  a  coral  island.  He 
does  not  expect  to  raise  society  ninety  feet  into  the  air 
in  his  lifetime.  Those  who  argue  with  Mr.  Hardie  will 
always  find  one  difficulty  about  him.  He  knows  pretty 
well  what  he  is  talking  about."  Thus  the  American 
pressman  measured  him  up,  if  not  quite  accurately, 
with  some  superficial  shrewdness. 

At  Chicago  his  reception  was  on  a  bigger  scale  even 
than  at  New  York.  This  was  accounted  for  partly  by 
the  fact  that  his  visit  coincided  with  the  great  Labour 
Day  demonstrations  at  which  he  was  regarded  as  the 
chief  speaker,  and  he  was  well  reported  in  the  press. 
Here  he  diverged  sixty  miles  north  to  Woodstock,  where 
Eugene  V.  Debs  was  in  prison  on  a  charge  arising  out 
of  the  part  he  had  played  in  the  Pullman  strike.  Hardie 
was  hugely  tickled  when  Debs  himself  came  down  the 
prison  steps  with  a  "walk  right  in  and  make  yourselves 
at  home."  The  great  labour  leader  has  been  in  prison 
since  then,  and  has  been  under  much  more  rigid  surveil- 
lance. He  is  there,  much  to  the  disgrace  of  America, 
whilst  this  is  being  written. 

During  his  brief  sojourn  at  Chicago  and  Milwaukee 
he  attended  a  nomination  convention  and  gained  some 
insight  into  American  electoral  methods.  When  he 
came  away  it  was  "with  a  feeling  of  regret  that  so  many 
earnest,  wholehearted  reformers  were  engaged  in 
fighting  such  side  issues  as  the  silver  question  when 
by  going  straight  for  the  Socialist  ticket  they  would 
settle  that  and  many  other  questions." 

The  tour  took  the  travellers  almost  as  far  west  as 
they  could  get.  They  went  to  Denver,  Leadville,  "two 

"5 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

hundred  feet  up  in  the  clouds/'  Colorado  Springs,  Salt 
Lake  City,  San  Francisco,  and  the  Montana  mining 
district,  Altruria,  Santa  Rosa,  Kansas  City,  St.  Louis, 
and  many  other  places  not  in  the  way  of  the  ordinary 
tourist. 

At  San  Francisco  the  travellers  ran  up  against  the 
"Almighty  Dollar"  on  a  somewhat  big  scale.  The 
Mayor  of  the  city,  better  known 'as  the  "Silver  King" 
from  the  fact  that  he  had  amassed  millions  of  dollars 
out  of  silver-mining  and  speculation,  was  an  ardent 
believer  in  bimetallism,  which  was  at  that  time  the  chief 
plank  in  Mr.  Bryan's  platform  as  candidate  for  the 
Presidency.  The  Mayor  had  persuaded  himself  that  if 
it  could  be  shown  that  England  was  falling  into  line 
with  the  American  bimetallist  campaign  it  would  greatly 
help  Mr.  Bryan's  candidature,  and  he  put  it  to  Hardie, 
in  the  presence  of  Frank  Smith  and  the  Rev.  Mr.  Scott 
of  the  Presbyterian  Church,  as  a  business  proposition 
that  he  should  get  the  I.L.P.  to  make  a  declaration  in 
favour  of  bimetallism,  or,  failing  that,  that  he  should 
himself  make  a  speech  in  its  favour  as  Chairman  at  the 
I.L.P.  Annual  Conference  in  return  for  which  service 
Hardie  would  receive  a  cheque  for  100,000  dollars — 
about  £20,000.  The  Mayor  and  the  minister  were  both 
surprised  when  Hardie  and  Frank  Smith  laughed  the 
idea  out  of  court,  the  Mayor  especially  being  quite 
unable  to  comprehend  the  point  of  view  of  a  labour 
leader  who  could  turn  down  a  business  proposal  of 
this  kind. 

There  were  doubtless  many  others  equally  mystified 
by  such  conduct.  To  them  it  almost  seemed  as  if  this 
inexplicable  Scotsman  had  a  contempt  for  "siller."  He 
had  refused  the  Liberal  Party  money.  He  had  refused 
the  Carnegie  money.  He  had  refused  the  money  from 
the  Edinburgh  ladies,  and  now  he  had  rejected  almost 


AMERICA 

contemptuously  a  fairly  substantial  fortune  in  return  for 
a  speech. 

Forty-eight  hours  later  the  two  travellers  landed  in 
Butte  City  possessed  of  a  financial  equipment  of  exactly 
one  dollar,  ten  cents. — about  five  and  sixpence — to  find 
that  remittances  expected  from  Chicago  had  not  arrived. 
The  story  of  how  a  providential  Scottish  piper  saved  the 
situation  afforded  Hardie  many  a  reminiscent  chuckle 
in  days  to  come.  The  local  comrades,  chiefly  Knights 
of  Labour,  had  placed  a  buggy  at  their  disposal  to  enable 
them  to  see  the  sights,  and,  when  returning  from  a  visit 
to  an  Indian  encampment,  their  ears  were  regaled  by 
sounds  which  set  the  Scotsman's  blood  tingling.  "Do 
you  hear  that  music  ?"  he  said  to  the  driver.  "That  ain't 
no  music,"  was  the  reply/'  that's  the  Scotch  pipes." 
"Drive  to  where  they  are  being  played,"  said  Hardie, 
and  the  driver,  whose  appreciation  of  Scotch  whisky  was 
greater  than  his  knowledge  of  Scottish  music,  speedily 
landed  his  fares  at  the  door  of  a  wooden  drinking  saloon 
whose  proprietor,  a  stalwart  Scot  of  the  Macdonald  clan, 
was  marching  in  front  of  the  bar  playing  reels  and  High- 
land dirges,  and  who,  with  his  drouthy  customers,  hailed 
the  Labour  man  from  the  Old  Country  with  enthusiasm. 
A  meeting  in  the  Opera  House  was  arranged  impromptu 
for  the  same  evening,  an3,  thanks  to  the  rallying  power 
of  Macdonald's  pipes,  a  crowded  audience  heard  the 
Socialist  message.  Seventy-five  dollars  were  handed  to 
Hardie  as  the  surplus  after  paying  all  expenses.  "And 
that,"  said  Keir,  when  telling  the  story,  "was  how 
Providence  came  to  the  rescue  at  Butte  City." 

Hardie  addressed  meetings  in  most  of  the  important 
towns,  and  in  the  industrial  districts.  He  conferred  with 
the  trade  union  and  Socialist  leaders  and  with  all  kinds 
of  public  officials,  and  in  every  possible  way  tried  to  gain 
information  concerning  industrial  and  political  condi- 

J  117 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

tions.  But  he  did  not  delude  himself  into  the  belief  that 
he  had  learned  sufficient  to  justify  him  in  speaking  as  an 
authority  on  American  Labour  problems.  As  he  said 
in  summing  up  :  "The  impressions  one  gets  in  hurrying 
across  a  great  continent  are  necessarily  mere  surface  im- 
pressions, and  do  not  qualify  one  to  dogmatise  or  even  to 
describe.  I  like  to  know,  not  only  what  appears  to  the 
observation,  but  the  causes  which  have  produced  the 
things  seen,  and  these  are  not  always  so  easily  obtained." 
"Still,"  he  continued,  "I  have  the  feeling  that  having 
gone  there  to  learn,  the  visit  in  this  respect  has  not  been 
entirely  in  vain.  Of  one  thing  I  am  certain.  The  cause 
of  Socialism  and  the  I.L.P.  has  been  benefited,  and  some 
fresh  links  have  been  forged  in  the  chain  which  will  one 
day  bind  the  workers  of  the  world  in  international  soli- 
darity. There  as  here,  we  found  that  the  common  sense 
of  Socialism  is  a  much  more  powerful  argument  than  its 
hard,  dry,  scientific,  economic  justification.  Few  people 
are  scientists,  but  all  are  human,  and  the  secret  of  the 
Success  of  the  I.L.P.  here  at  home  has  been  the  homely, 
essentially  human  tone  which  has  been  the  chief  note  of 
its  teaching." 

That  last  sentence  is  exceedingly  illuminative  of 
Hardie's  own  Socialist  inspiration.  He  was  not  of  the 
stuff  of  which  doctrinaires  are  made. 

The  winter  of  1895  was  a  very  distressful  one,  especi- 
ally in  the  west  of  Scotland,  where,  in  addition  to  the 
unemployment  consequent  upon  trade  depression,  there 
was  a  lock-out  of  engineers  which  lasted  for  several 
months,  and  of  course  affected  some  of  the  auxiliary  occu- 
pations. Socialists,  as  such,  were  not  in  a  position  to 
intervene,  and  could  only  make  use  of  the  trouble  as 
propaganda  against  the  capitalist  system. 

There  was  no  Keir  Hardie  in  Parliament  to  help  to 
focus  political  opinion  on  the  industrial  question,  and  the 

118 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

Tory  Government,  with  no  effective  criticism  from  the 
Liberal  Opposition,  could  afford  to  let  matters  drift. 
During  the  first  few  weeks  after  his  return  from  America, 
Hardie's  domestic  affairs,  concerning  which  he  was 
always  very  reticent,  naturally  absorbed  much  of  his 
attention,  as  also  did  the  affairs  of  the  "Labour  Leader." 
Previous  to  his  departure  for  America  he  had  found  it 
necessary  to  appeal  to  readers  and  sympathisers  to  re- 
double their  efforts  for  an  increased  circulation  and 
advertisement  revenue.  There  had  been  a  very 
encouraging  response,  but  the  ship  was  still  in  troubled 
waters  financially.  It  is  doubtful  if  it  ever  fully  emerged 
from  this  trouble  during  all  the  years  whilst  Hardie  was 
responsible  for  its  guidance.  Yet  somehow  he  managed 
to  keep  it  going. 

A  statement  which  he  made  at  this  time  helps  to  throw 
light  on  another  matter  which  has  sometimes  been  a 
source  of  conjecture  to  friends  as  well  as  enemies — his 
relationship  to  the  movement  financially.  In  response 
to  enquiries  as  to  his  terms  for  lectures  he  said  :  "I  have 
endeavoured,  not  with  much  success,  to  clear  my  out-of- 
pocket  expenses  from  these  talking  engagements.  Train 
fares  and  travel  mean  money.  So  does  postage.  So 
does  the  loss  of  time  involved  in  connection  with  the  work 
which,  in  the  case  of  a  man  who  earns  his  living  by  his 
pen,  as  I  do,  comes  to  a  serious  item.  The  return  jour- 
ney between  Scotland  and  London  costs  about  £3  IDS. 
in  fares  and  necessary  food.  To  some  parts  of  the 
Kingdom  it  costs  more;  to  some  less.  I  found  two  years 
ago  that  a  fixed  uniform  charge  of  £3  35.  for  all  meetings 
in  the  provinces  enabled  me  to  meet  all  expenses.  This 
charge  covers  everything,  hotel  bill,  travelling  and  all 
other  outlays.  When  I  am  living  in  London  or  Glasgow 
these  places  have  all  the  meetings  they  want,  and  there  is 
no  question  of  fee  or  expense."  It  is  quite  clear  from 

119 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

this  statement  that  the  I.L.P.  offered  no  inducement  to 
adventurers  in  search  of  fame  or  fortune.  It  had  neither 
political  preferment  nor  financial  advantage  to  offer  to  its 
adherents,  nor  any  soft  jobs.  Yet  it  continued  to  attract 
into  its  ranks  many  men  and  women  of  high  attainments. 

It  must,  at  any  rate,  be  quite  clear  that  the  founder  of 
the  I.L.P.  was  not  living  luxuriously.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  during  his  first  three  years  in  Parliament,  twenty- 
five  shillings  a  week  was  the  most  he  was  able  to  remit  to 
Mrs.  Hardie  in  Cumnock,  and  sometimes  not  even  so 
much  as  that. 

On  December  2ist,  he  presided  at  a  dinner  given  to 
"Labour  Leader"  contributors  at  the  Albion  Hotel, 
Ludgate  Circus,  London,  and  paid  tribute  to  the  satisfac- 
tory service  rendered  by  his  co-workers  on  the  paper. 
This  meeting,  however,  is  chiefly  memorable  because  it 
was  the  occasion  of  the  last  public  utterance  of  Sergius 
Stepniak,  the  great  Russian  Nihilist  exile,  whose  book. 
* ' Underground  Russia,"  was  the  first  revelation  to  the 
British  people  of  the  working  of  those  tremendous  unseen 
forces  beneath  the  surface  of  Russian  society  whose 
effects  are  now  plainly  visible  to  the  whole  world.  Parts 
of  the  speech  may  be  quoted  as  illustrative  alike  of  the 
characters  of  Stepniak  and  Hardie  and  of  the  similarity 
of  Socialist  conception  by  which  both  men  were  inspired. 

"Socialism/5  said  Stepniak,  "is  now  the  only  force 
able  to  inspire  men  with  that  boundless  devotion,  and 
utter  disregard  for  personal  safety  which  we  see  constantly 
exhibited  by  Socialists  in  every  land.  It  is  remarkable 
that  whenever  you  have  before  you  a  movement  which  is 
really  like  the  religious  movement  at  the  time  of  the 
Reformation,  it  is  Socialism  which  is  behind  it.  It  is  so 
in  Russia,  France,  Germany,  America — everywhere." 
Speaking  of  the  great  growth  of  the  Socialist  movement 
in  this  country,  he  said  :  "Although  I  know  that  my  com- 

120 


INDUSTRIAL    STRIFE 

rade  in  the  chair  does  not  like  signalling  out  personalities, 
I  feel  it  is  only  fair  to  say  that  Keir  Hardie  was  the  one 
man  in  England  who  did  more  than  most  in  that  great 
work.  There  are  points  in  his  programme  with  which  I 
do  not  entirely  agree,  but  I  cannot  help  admiring  in  his 
individuality,  the  character,  the  straightforwardness,  the 
perfect  simplicity  and  unconquerable  energy  which  finds 
renewed  impulse  in  every  obstacle.  Keir  Hardie  has 
shown  what  an  Englishman  can  do.  I  can  say  that  in  the 
name  of  thousands  of  my  comrades  in  Russia,  where 
Keir  Hardie's  name  is  as  well  known  as  that  of  the  great- 
est of  Englishmen."  Two  days  later  Stepniak  was  dead, 
having  been  run  down  by  a  passing  train  while  crossing 
the  railway  line  on  his  way  to  a  meeting  of  his  co-patriots 
in  another  part  of  London.  The  following  Saturday, 
there  gathered  outside  Waterloo  Station  representatives 
of  the  world-wide  revolutionary  movement,  to  pay  tribute 
to  his  memory  and  to  renew  their  vows  of  devotion  to  the 
common  cause.  His  fellow  countrymen,  Kropotkin  and 
Volkhovsky ;  Bernstein,  of  the  German  Social  Democrats ; 
Malatesta,  of  Italy;  Nazarbeck,  of  Armenia;  William 
Morris,  Keir  Hardie,  Herbert  Burrows,  John  Burns,  of 
the  British  Socialist  movement,  besides  many  representa- 
tives of  art  and  science  and  literature,  and  a  sad  concourse 
of  exiles,  mourning  the  loss  of  their  great  brother. 

Stepniak,  like  so  many  of  the  Russian  revolutionary 
leaders,  was  born  in  the  ruling  class,  and  had  given  all 
his  power  and  genius  to  the  overthrow  of  that  class.  He 
had  organised  secret  propaganda  and  revolt,  had  found  it 
necessary  to  meet  violence  with  violence,  and — it  was 
believed — had  helped  to  rid  the  world  of  more  than  one 
of  its  worst  tyrants.  Yet  the  testimony  of  all  his  associ- 
ates declared  him  to  be  one  of  the  gentlest  of  men,  a 
man  of  a  sweet  and  a  lovable  nature.  When  the  I.L.P. 
was  formed  he  joined  immediately,  and  between  him  and 

121 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Hardie  there  had  been  frequent  intercourse.  Hardie 
was  also  at  this  time  on  terms  of  intimacy  with  Kropotkin 
and  had  spent  hours  at  his  home  drinking  samovar-made 
tea,  and  smoking  many  pipes  of  tobacco  while  the  apostle 
of  Anarchism  paced  the  floor  of  his  paper-littered  room 
and  gave  illustration  after  illustration  to  prove  that  par- 
liamentary institutions  were  "a  quicksand  in  which 
honesty,  manhood,  courage,  and  all  else  were  lost." 
"Were  we  all  Kropotkins,"  said  Hardie,  "Anarchism 
would  be  the  only  possible  system,  since  government  and 
restraint  would  be  unnecessary." 

Naturally,  communion  with  these  and  other  strong 
souls,  purified  as  by  fire  through  persecution  and  suffer- 
ing, was  not  without  influence  on  a  mind  that,  up  to  the 
very  last,  never  ceased  to  expand.  His  perception  of 
the  fact  that  though  many  people  have  the  same  pur- 
pose, they  must  of  necessity  approach  their  problems 
from  different  angles  and  from  different  circumstances, 
made  him  averse  to  dogmatise  as  to  methods  and  he  was 
tolerant  of  Socialists  and  reformers  whose  ways  were  not 
as  his  ways.  This  trait  in  his  character  was  very  evident 
at  the  International  Congress  this  year  when  the  place 
of  Anarchists  in  the  Socialist  movement  became  a  very 
vital  question. 

The  Congress,  which  was  held  in  the  Queen's  Hall, 
London,  began  on  Monday,  July  27th,  and  continued  for 
six  days.  The  organising  committee  responsible  for  call- 
ing it  had  to  be  guided  by  the  following  resolution 
passed  by  the  Congress  held  at  Zurich  in  1892  :  "All 
trade  unions  shall  be  admitted  to  the  Congress,  also,  all 
those  Socialist  parties  and  organisations  which  recognise 
the  necessity  for  the  organisation  of  the  workers  and  for 
political  action. 

"By  political  action  is  meant  that  the  working-class 
organisations  seek,  as  far  as  possible,  to  use  or  con- 

122 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

quer  political  rights  and  the  machinery  of  legislation  for 
the  furthering  of  the  interests  of  the  proletariat  and  the 
conquest  of  political  power." 

Upon  the  interpretation  and  application  of  this  "stand- 
ing order,"  so  un-English  in  its  dress  and  form,  there 
was  much  and  heated  debate.  A  considerable  number 
of  delegates,  especially  from  Holland  and  France,  had 
come  with  credentials  from  societies  that  did  not  include 
parliamentary  action  in  their  programmes.  Some  of  these 
were  trade  unions  pure  and  simple  which  had  sent  well- 
known  Anarchists  as  their  delegates.  There  were  also 
"Free  Communists" — all  non-parliamentarians.  Hardie 
was  in  favour  of  their  admission .  "It  might  be  alleged , ' ' 
he  said,  in  defining;  his  position  at  the  meeting  of  the 
I.L.P.  section,  "that  if  they  supported  these  people's 
claims  they  were  sympathising  with  Anarchists.  For  his 
part,  he  was  more  afraid  of  doing  an  unfair  thing  towards 
a  body  of  Socialists  with  whom  he  did  not  see  eye  to 
eye,  than  he  was  of  being  called  an  Anarchist."  Tom 
Mann  took  the  same  point  of  view,  and  both  supported 
their  positions  in  the  Congress.  The  I.L.P.  delegates 
were  divided  on  the  question,  but  the  German  section 
and  the  British  S.D.F.,  who  largely  dominated  the  Con- 
gress proceedings,  were  united  in  refusing  admission  to 
the  non-parliamentarians.  In  the  end,  Anarchist  dele- 
gates were  excluded,  though  many  of  the  prominent 
Anarchists  found  entrance  as  trade  unionists.  Funda- 
mentally, the  question  at  issue  was  the  same  question 
which  had  divided  Bakunin  and  Marx  in  the  days  of  the 
old  International  and  which  in  these  days  still  intervenes 
to  prevent  the  reconstitution  of  a  united  international 
Socialist  movement.  Modern  Socialism  is  simply  the 
concrete  expression  of  ideas  of  government  which  at 
that  time  had  not  passed  the  stage  of  being  mere  formulae. 
Hardie  did  not  think  it  well  that  the  whole  movement 

123 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

should  be   bound   rigidly   along  a    certain   fixed   pre- 
^      conceived  line  of  development,  and  he  believed  that 
political  and  industrial  methods  were  not  irreconcilable. 
v      This  seems  the  right  place  to  bring  into  view  Hardie's 
opinions  on  the  general  strike.     He  had  endeavoured, 
without  success,  to  get  the  I.L.P.  to  put  down  a  resolu- 
tion in  favour  of  a  general  strike  for  the  achievement  of 
a    universal    eight-hours'    day,    and    in    the    "Labour 
Leader "  he  expressed  regret  that  an  opportunity  had  not 
been  provided  for  discussing  the  proposal  at  the  Con- 
gress.    In  this  article  he  declared  himself  definitely  in 
favour  of  it,  and  adduced  arguments  which  seem  more 
weighty  to-day  than    they    did    then,    perhaps    chiefly 
because  the  objective  has  changed  from  an  eight-hours' 
day  to  the  much  bigger  one  of  making  an  end  of  war.    It 
y'must  be  remembered  that  Hardie  had  been  cradled  and 
reared  in  the  midst  of  industrial  strife,  and  that  though 
he  was  now  the  foremost  advocate  in  this  country  of 
political  action,  and  was  continually  advising  the  miners 
that  through  the  ballot  box  they  could  achieve  their  ends 
more  quickly  than  by  industrial  action,  he  had    never 
counselled  them  to  let  go  the  strike  weapon.    Through- 
out his  American  tour  he  had  been  impressed  by    the 
backwardness    of  labour  political  organisation  in    that 
country  and  by  the  readiness  of  masses  of  the  workers 
to  come  out  on  strike,  and  he  believed  that,  by  a  policy 
of  this  kind,  the  political  actionists  and  the  industrial 
actionists  in  Europe  might  find  common  ground.     He 
did  not,  however,  believe  in  any  mere  spasmodic  light- 
ning strike  policy.      He  recognised  that  for  successful 
international  action  long  preparation  was  necessary.  His 
suggestion  was  that  the  International  Congress  Bureau 
should  take  charge  of  the  movement,  that  the  date  of  the 
general  strike  should  be  fixed  four  years  in  advance,  and 
that    the    intervening    time    should    be    employed    in 

124 


FREE    SPEECH 

propaganda  and  organisation  and  in  the  co-ordinating  of 
the  labour  sections  in  every  part  of  Europe,  America, 
and  Australia.  He  believed  further,  that  such  a  move-  v- 
ment  would  force  the  hands  of  the  international  diplomat- 
ists, and  compel  them  to  agree  to  the  establishment  of 
common  labour  conditions  in  all  countries.  He,  in  fact, 
supported  the  general  strike,  believing  that  the  more 
effectively  it  was  organised  the  less  need  would  there  be 
for  putting  it  into  operation,  while  the  preparations  for  it 
would  tend  to  unify  the  forces  working  for  international 
Socialism.  It  is  not  the  business  of  the  biographer  to 
discuss  these  theories  and  policies,  but  simply  to  present 
as  faithfully  as  may  be  the  mental  processes  of  the  man 
whose  life  is  being  portrayed. 

During  the  greater  part  of  this  summer,  the  I.L.P. 
was  engaged  in  defending  the  right  of  free  speech.  Ever 
since  its  formation,  the  I.L.P.  had  used  the  open-air 
meeting  to  an  extent  never  attempted  previously. 
Wherever  a  branch  of  the  party  existed,  the  out-door 
Socialist  meeting  became  a  feature  of  the  public  life  of 
the  district.  Exceedingly  capable  lecturers  addressed 
these  meetings.  Assisted  by  local  speakers  who  were 
always  ready  to  reinforce  the  efforts  of  the  more 
experienced  platform  orators,  J.  Bruce  Glasier,  Mrs. 
Bruce  .Glasier,  Enid  Stacy,  Caroline  Martyn,  S.  D. 
Shallard,  Joseph  Burgess,  Tom  Mann,  Leonard  Hall, 
Keir  Hardie  and  a  host  of  others,  were  continually  on 
the  move  from  place  to  place.  In  many  places  large 
audiences  were  attracted  and  Socialist  leaflets  and 
pamphlets  were  widely  circulated.  Naturally,  the  more 
conservative  elements  in  the  community  did  not  look 
upon  these  signs  of  active  life  with  favour,  and  in  various 
localities  they  sought  to  invoke  law  and  authority  to 
stop  the  flood  of,  what  seemed  to  them,  pernicious 
doctrine.  The  usual  result  was  to  give  the  new  move- 

125 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

ment  a  bigger  advertisement.  The  greatest  of  these 
fights  took  place  at  Manchester.  What  was  known  as  the 
"Boggart  Hole  Clough  case"  filled  the  papers  for  some 
time  and  excited  every  branch  of  the  I.L.P.  in  the 
country.  It  was,  however,  only  typical  of  what  took 
place  on  a  lesser  scale  in  many  other  districts. 

Boggart  Hole  Clough  is  a  kind  of  glen  situated  in  a 
public  park  then  recently  acquired  by  the  Manchester 
City  Council.  The  I.L.P.  had  been  holding  meetings 
there,  and,  on  the  plea  that  they  were  causing  an 
obstruction,  the  Parks  Committee  decided  to  prohibit 
the  meetings.  The  I.L.P.  paid  no  attention  to  the 
prohibition,  maintaining  that  there  was  no  obstruction. 
Their  speakers,  however,  were  summoned  before  the 
stipendiary  magistrate  and  fined.  Two  of  them,  Mr. 
Leonard  Hall  and  Mr.  Fred  Brocklehurst,  went  to 
prison  for  a  month  rather  than  pay  the  fine.  Week  by 
week  the  prosecution  of  speakers  and  literature  sellers 
continued.  But  the  Party  had  determined  to  fight  the 
matter  out,  and  fight  it  out  it  did.  Week  by  week  the 
meetings  were  held  and  the  audiences  grew  bigger  and 
bigger.  The  accused  persons,  amongst  whom  were 
J.  Bruce  Glasier,  Keir  Hardie  and  Mrs.  Pankhurst— 
the  latter  not  yet  notorious  in  the  suffrage  movement- 
defended  themselves  in  court.  Boggart  Hole  Clough 
and  the  Manchester  Court  House  became  the  two  most 
interesting  places  in  Lancashire,  both  radiating  valuable 
Socialist  propaganda.  Notices  of  appeal  to  higher 
courts  were  intimated,  and  Boggart  Hole  Clough 
threatened  to  become  a  national  question.  The 
stipendiary  began  to  find  excuses  for  adjourning  without 
passing  sentence.  The  climax  came  when  Hardie 
intimated  that  he  had  four  hundred  and  seventy-three 
witnesses  to  call.  That  finished  it.  There  were  no  more 
prosecutions.  By-laws  were  framed  which  enabled  the 

126 


FREE  SPEECH 

Parks  Committee  to  climb  down  without  too  much  loss 
of  dignity,  and  the  Boggart  Hole  Clough  question 
ceased  from  troubling.  The  general  eifect  was  to  con- 
firm the  British  right  of  public  meeting  and  freedom 
of  speech,  a  right  which  not  even  the  exceptional  war- 
time regulations  of  recent  years  were  able  to  destroy. 

The  free  speech  agitation  was  good  for  the  I.L.P. 
At  the  Annual  Conference  held  at  Nottingham,  in  April, 
there  had  been  some  signs  of  lassitude,  due  probably 
to  reaction  from  the  extraordinary  electioneering  exer- 
tions of  the  previous  year.  A  by-election  in  May,  at 
Aberdeen,  where  Tom  Mann  polled  2,479  votes  and 
reduced  the  Liberal  majority  from  3,548  to  430,  had 
helped  greatly  to  re-inspire  the  rank  and  file  throughout 
the  country  with  a  belief  that  their  movement  was  very 
far  from  being  a  forlorn  hope ;  and  now  this  struggle  for 
free  speech,  which,  on  a  smaller  scale,  had  to  be  main- 
tained in  many  other  places  than  Manchester,  provided 
just  the  kind  of  stimulus  required  for  a  party,  which,  if  it 
were  to  continue,  must  be  continually  fighting  and  putting 
itself  in  evidence  in  competition  with  the  other  parties. 

Following  quickly  upon  this  stimulus  came  the 
opportunity  of  a  by-election  at  East  Bradford,  and  it 
was  decided  to  contest  the  seat,  not  with  much  hope 
that  it  could  be  won,  but  partly  to  test  the  strength  of 
the  movement  in  a  district  which  was  the  birthplace  of 
the  I.L.P.,  and  partly  to  exploit  the  opportunity  for 
propaganda  afforded  by  a  contest  which  would  arrest 
the  attention  of  the  whole  country.  Hardie  himself  was 
chosen  as  the  candidate  and  entered  into  the  fray  with 
his  customary  vigour.  "Not  as  one  would/'  he  said, 
"but  as  one  must — that  I  suppose  is  the  guiding  prin- 
ciple, and  so  I  go.  We  will  make  a  fight  of  it,  and  the 
I.L.P.  has  never  yet  had  occasion  to  regret  its  by- 
election  contests,  neither  will  it  East  Bradford." 

127 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

It  was  a  three-cornered  contest,  and  like  every  other 
parliamentary  election  in  which  Hardie  was  one  of  the 
principals,  was  conducted  with  exceeding  acrimony  on 
the  part  of  his  opponents,  the  Liberals  as  usual  carrying 
off  the  palm  for  unscrupulousness  and  making  no  secret 
of  the  fact  that  they  were  more  concerned  to  keep 
Hardie  out  than  to  win  the  seat  from  the  Tories.  Three 
years  of  him  at  Westminster  had  been  more  than  enough 
for  them.  In  the  words  of  T.  P.  O'Connor:  "Keir 
Hardie  had  to  be  fought."  In  the  end,  the  Conservative 
candidate  was  returned  by  a  majority  of  395  over  the 
Liberal,  and  Hardie  received  1,953  votes. 

The  orthodox  political  oracles  were  not  slow  to 
appreciate  the  meaning  of  the  Labour  poll.  Said  the 
"Times"  :  "The  Independent  Labour  Party  seems  to 
have  drawn  away  votes  in  nearly  the  same  proportion 
from  the  ministerialist  as  from  the  opposition."  Said 
the  "Morning  Post"  :  "We  have  no  desire  to  make  little 
of  the  Labour  vote  in  Bradford,  for  it  is  clear  that  two 
thousand  electors  are  ready  to  support  a  Labour  candi- 
date in  both  the  Eastern  and  the  Western  divisions,  and 
such  a  body  might  well  hope  to  turn  the  scale  in  the 
event  of  a  contest  being  confined  to  a  Unionist  and  a 
Radical."  They  need  have  had  no  dread  of  that 
eventuality.  The  I.L.P.  had  no  desire  to  become  merely 
the  deciding  factor  between  the  two  political  sections 
of  capitalism.  Its  aim  was  to  demonstrate  the  identity 
of  interest  embodied  in  these  two  sections  and  to 
organise  the  workers  for  the  purpose  of  fighting  both  and 
of  destroying  the  system  which  they  represent.  Hardie 
made  this  unmistakably  clear,  both  in  his  "Leader" 
comments  and  in  an  article  which  he  wrote  for  the 
"Progressive  Review,"  at  that  time  edited  by  William 
Clarke.  In  this  he  derided  the  attempts  of  Liberal 
spokesmen  to  make  out  that  the  Liberal  Party  and  the 

128 


INDUSTRIAL    STRIFE 

I.L.P.  had  common  aims  and  needed  each  other's  help. 
This  article  was  replied  to  in  the  same  magazine  by 
Mr.  Herbert  Samuel,  then  regarded  as  one  of  Liberal- 
ism's coming  men,  a  fact  which  is  mentioned  here 
simply  to  show  how  definitely  the  ex-miner  was  accepted 
as  the  exponent  of  the  new  political  force.  They  might 
vilify  and  abuse  and  misrepresent  him  in  theft  party 
press.  They  might  ridicule  and  caricature  him  in  their 
comic  papers.  But  there  was  one  thing  they  could  not 
do.  They  could  not  ignore  him.  He  was  an  estab- 
lished factor  in  the  political  life  of  the  nation,  and  his 
influence  had  to  be  reckoned  with  in  every  move  in  the 
game  of  party  politics.  It  must  be  said  that  Hardie 
never  made  any  attempt  to  soften  the  asperities  of 
political  controversy.  He  was  well  endowed  with  that 
aggressiveness  which  is  an  essential  part  of  the  equip- 
ment of  any  man  who  seeks  to  make  headway  on  the 
political  battlefield,  and  he  sought  always  to  accentuate 
rather  than  modify  the  essential  antagonisms  between 
the  old  order  and  the  new.  The  one  thing  he  feared 
for  the  I.L.P.  at  this  time  was  the  possible  sacrifice  of 
independence  for  the  sake  of  some  immediate  gain  or 
illusory  concession,  and  he  seemed  deliberately  to 
maintain  a  situation  in  which  compromise  would  be 
impossible. 

Nor  was  it  from  the  capitalist  parties  only  that  he  had 
to  face  criticism.  Strange  to  say,  he  was  suspected  by  V 
certain  sections  of  the  Socialist  movement  itself,  notably, 
the  Social  Democratic  Federation,  which,  in  its  weekly 
organ,  "Justice,"  ostentatiously  dissociated  itself  from 
Hardie  on  the  ground  that  he  did  not  represent  the 
Socialist  movement  of  this  country.  The  chief  counts 
against  him  were  that  in  Parliament  he  had  muddled 
the  unemployment  question,  had  at  the  International 
Congress  identified  himself  with  the  Anarchists,  and 

129 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

had  said  in  the  country  that  Socialism  was  not  a  question 
of  economics  at  all — a  series  of  charges  which  seemed 
to  show  that  the  capacity  for  misrepresentation  was  not 
monopolised  by  his  capitalist  critics.  He  replied  by  a 
statement  of  facts  concerning  his  parliamentary  work 
and  his  attitude  towards  Anarchism,  and  by  a  declara- 
tion of  his  Socialist  principles,  which,  while  it  repudiated 
the  charge  of  indifference  to  economics,  showed  quite 
clearly  that  he  was  not  the  same  kind  of  Socialist  that 
his  critics  claimed  to  be.  "I  am  a  Socialist  because 
Socialism  means  Fraternity  founded  on  Justice,  and  the 
fact  that  in  order  to  secure  this  it  is  necessary  to  transfer 
land  and  capital  from  private  to  public  ownership  is  a 
mere  incident  in  the  crusade.  My  contention  is  that 
under  present  circumstances  we  are  under  the  necessity 
of  keeping  this  side  uppermost,  and  my  protest  is  against 
this  being  considered  the  whole  of  Socialism  or  even  the 
vital  part  of  it."  He  was  exposed  to  a  perpetual  cross- 
fire from  capitalists,  Socialist  doctrinaires  and  laggard 
trade  unionists,  and  there  was  never  any  danger  of  his 
controversial  weapons  becoming  rusty  for  lack  of  practice. 
Intellectual  stagnation  was  not  possible  for  Keir  Hardie. 
A  detailed  chronicle  of  his  public  activities  during 
these  years  would  probably  prove  to  be  monotonous 
reading,  but  the  experiences  of  that  period  were  far  from 
monotonous  for  those  who  passed  through  it.  It  was  a 
period  when  the  struggle  between  organised  labour, 
nationally  and  internationally,  seemed  to  grow  ever 
fiercer  and  fiercer.  Such  a  chronicle  would  have  to  tell 
the  story  of  the  long  drawn-out  Penrhyn  quarries  dis- 
pute, in  which  the  owner  of  the  soil  asserted  his  privilege 
as  a  landlord  and  as  an  employer,  by  simply  closing 
down  the  quarries  regardless  of  the  men's  right  to  work, 
the  consumer's  demand  for  the  commodity,  and  the 
State's  overlordship.  It  would  have  to  tell  of  the  great 

130 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

Hamburg  dock  strike,  of  the  help  given  by  the  workers 
of  this  country  and  the  strengthening  of  the  Inter- 
national Labour  alliance  thereby.  It  would  have  to  tell 
of  the  historic  lock-out  of  the  engineers,  which  lasted 
fully  six  months  and  revealed  itself  as  a  determined 
attempt  on  the  part  of  the  federated  employers  to 
destroy  Trade  Unionism.  It  would  have  to  tell  of  the 
persecution,  imprisonment  and  torture  of  Anarchists  in 
Spain,  of  the  consequent  assassination  of  Canovas,  the 
Spanish  Prime  Minister,  and  of  the  outburst  of  indigna- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  workers  of  all  countries  against 
the  atrocious  methods  of  the  Spanish  Government.  It 
would  have  to  tell  of  the  expulsion  of  Tom  Mann  from 
Germany,  and  Macpherson,  the  "Labour  Leader"  cor- 
respondent, from  France,  and  it  would  have  to  note  the 
slowly  gathering  clouds  of  war  which  finally  burst  over 
South  Africa  and  produced  in  this  country  a  fever  of 
Jingoism  which  threatened  to  extinguish  the  I.L.P.  and 
all  that  Hardie  and  his  associates  had  worked  for. 

To  all  these  events  and  movements  Hardie  was  in 
some  way,  directly  or  indirectly,  related — through  the 
"Labour  Leader"  and  on  the  platform,  giving  to  the 
wrongs  of  the  oppressed  at  home  and  abroad,  that 
sympathetic  publicity  withheld  by  the  capitalist  press 
and  capitalist  governments,  raising  funds  for  the 
relatives  of  men  on  strike  or  locked  out,  stating  the 
men's  case  clearly  and  strongly,  not  merely  in  relation  to 
the  particular  industry  immediately  affected,  but  in 
relation  to  the  general  Labour  movement,  and  emphasis- 
ing always  the  comprehensive  significance  of  all  these 
troubles  as  the  inevitable  outcome  of  capitalism  in  its 
present  stage  of  development,  finally  curable  only 
through  Socialism.  In  these  years  Socialists  had  some- 
thing more  to  do  than  propound  theories  about  value 
and  economic  rent,  and  the  people  were  in  no  mood 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

either  to  listen  to  these  theories  or  to  understand  them. 
For  many  of  them  the  immediate  struggle  was  with  the 
wolf  at  the  door,  and  the  business  of  the  Socialist 
agitator  was  to  help  his  class  to  fight  the  wolf.  It  was 
a  serious  loss  that  Hardie  was  not  in  Parliament  during 
those  years. 

His  1897  Christmas  message  in  the  "Labour  Leader" 
is  not  pleasant  reading.  4<I  am  afraid  my  heart  is  bitter 
to-night,  and  so  the  thoughts  and  feelings  that  pertain  to 
Christmas  are  far  from  me.  But  when  I  think  of  the 
thousands  of  white-livered  poltroons  who  will  take  the 
Christ's  name  in  vain,  and  yet  not  see  His  image  being 
crucified  in  every  hungry  child,  I  cannot  think  of  peace. 
I  have  known  as  a  child  what  hunger  means,  and  the  scars 
of  those  days  are  with  me  still  and  rankle  in  my  heart, 
and  unfit  me  in  many  ways  for  the  work  to  be  done.  A 
holocaust  of  every  Church  building  in  Christendom  to- 
night would  be  as  an  act  of  sweet  savour  in  the  sight  of 
Him  whose  name  is  supposed  to  be  worshipped  within 
their  walls.  If  the  spiritually-proud  and  pride-blinded 
professors  of  Christianity  could  only  be  made  to  feel  and 
see  that  the  Christ  is  here  present  with  us,  and  that  they 
are  laying  on  the  stripes  and  binding  the  brow  afresh 
with  thorns,  and  making  Him  shed  tears  of  blood 
in  a  million  homes,  surely  the  world  would  be  made 
more  fit  for  His  Kingdom.  We  have  no  right  to 
a  merry  Christmas  which  so  many  of  our  fellows 
cannot  share." 

It  was  not  often  that  Hardie  wrote  with  such  bitterness, 
but  his  words  were  no  more  than  an  expression  of  the 
thoughts  in  many  minds  at  this  time. 

Not  alone  did  the  industrial  struggles  and  their  con- 
comitant miseries  fill  the  minds  of  thoughtful  people 
with  fears  for  the  future ;  there  were  also  the  continued 
outstretching  of  rival  groups  of  capitalists  in  search  of 

132 


INDUSTRIAL    STRIFE 

new  markets  and  the  military  preparations  of  the  several 
governments  presaging  international  war. 

In  his  presidential  address  to  the  I.L.P.  Conference 
of  1898,  at  Birmingham,  speaking  of  these  ominous  por- 
tents, he  defined  the  I.L.P.  attitude  towards  war.    From 
this  policy  the  Party  has  never  wavered  either  before  or 
since.    His  reference  to  war  expenditure  reads  strangely 
in  these  later  days  when  national  indebtedness  is  com- 
puted by  thousands  of  millions.     "The  terrible  spread 
of  the  war  fever  in  these  closing  years  of  the  century," 
he  said,  "was  to  be  deplored.     The  hundred  millions  of 
six  years  ago  has  become  the  hundred  and  six  millions  of 
to-day.       Naval    and    military  expenditure  is  for  ever 
increasing,  and  no  year  passes  without  seeing  its  little 
expedition  setting  out  with  the  object  of  grabbing  land 
which  is  either  of  little  use  to  hold  or  difficult  and  costly 
to  retain.    When  every  other  voice  is  silent  it  is  necessary 
that  we  should  make  it  known  that  we  are  opposed  to 
war  on  principle  as  well  as  on  account  of  the  cause  for 
which  it  is  now  being  waged.     I  do  not  say  we  should 
never    fight.      As    Rider    Haggard    has    said:     'The 
Almighty  has  endowed  us  with  life  and  doubtless  meant 
us  to  defend  it/    War  in  the  past  was  inevitable  when 
the  sword  constituted  the  only  court  of  appeal.    But  the 
old  reasons  for  war  have  passed  away,  and,  the  reasons 
gone,  war  should  go  also.    To-day  they  fight  to  extend 
markets,  and  no  Empire  can  stand  based  solely  on  the 
sordid  considerations  of  trade  and  commerce.     This  is 
running  the  Empire  on  the  lines  of  an  huckster's  shop, 
and  making  of  our  statesmen  only  glorified  bagmen." 
The  time  was  very  near  when  these  principles,  so 
strongly  enunciated,  were  to  be  put  to  the  severest  test, 
and  all  who  adhered  to  them  were  to  have  their  fidelity 
thoroughly  tried. 
At  this  Conference,  Mr.  John  Penny  became  secretary 

K  133 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

instead  of  Tom  Mann,  whose  energies  had  of  late  years 
been  more  and  more  absorbed  in  the  industrial  side  of 
the  movement,  especially  those  international  aspects  of 
it  reflected  in  the  Hamburg  dock  strike  and  in  similar 
upheavals  in  the  Australian  colonies.  Tom  Mann's 
services  to  the  I.L.P.  in  those  early  years  when  it  was 
finding  itself  were  undoubtedly  of  very  great  value,  and 
Hardie,  expressing  the  feelings  of  the  entire  member- 
ship, did  not  fail  to  pay  tribute  to  them. 

It  must  be  stated  here  that,  notwithstanding  the 
optimistic  declarations  of  Hardie  and  others,  the  I.L.P. 
was  at  this  time  passing  through  the  most  depressing 
period  of  its  history.  It  had  existed  for  five  years. 
It  had  fought  numerous  by-elections,  but  had  not  yet  a 
single  representative  in  Parliament.  It  had  ceased  to 
grow.  The  number  of  branches  reported  year  by  year 
remained  practically  stationary,  and  many  of  these 
branches  were  merely  nominal  and  consisted  in  some 
districts  of  small  groups  of  die-hards  who  had  no  room 
in  their  vocabulary  for  the  word  defeat.  The  Party  was 
at  this  time  saved  from  utter  stagnation  by  the  annually 
recurring  municipal  elections,  which  served  to  maintain 
the  fighting  spirit  locally,  and  by  the  indomitable  per- 
sistence of  its  propagandists,  of  whom  its  founder  and 
chairman  was  the  chief.  Hardie  seemed  not  to  know 
fatigue,  or  if  he  did,  never  showed  it.  It  is  not  too  much 
to  say  that  it  was  his  tireless  efforts,  carrying  hope  and 
inspiration  to  the  faint-hearted  and  despondent,  that 
kept  the  I.L.P.  alive.  The  following  itinerary  of  a 
fortnight's  work  set  down  by  himself,  will  serve  to  show 
how  fully  his  time  was  occupied  by  this  propagandist 
and  organising  activity  :— 

Nov.   17. — Left    home,     12     noon;     reached    London 
10.45  P-m- 

134 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

X8. Office  work.  Open-air  meeting  in  West  Ham 

at  night. 

I9> — Left  London  7.15  a.m.;  opened  bazaar  at 
Halifax  at  2.30;  spoke  at  Honley  at  8  p.m. 
20. — Halifax  Labour  Church,  two  meetings. 
21. — Opened  bazaar  at  3;  addressed  meeting  at 

Yeadon  at  8. 
„      22. — Addressed  meeting   Mexboro';  3   hours  in 

train. 

23. — Mexboro'   to   Kettering   in   train   3^  hours. 
Feet  wet  trudging  through  snow.     Meeting 
at  8. 
„      24. — Kettering  to  London.     Meeting  in  Canning 

Town. 
„      25. — London    to    Pendlebury,    5    hours.      Two 

committees. 
,,      26. — National    Administrative    Council,  10  to  5. 

Conference  Social  5  to  n. 
„      27. — 10.30  meeting    at    Eccles;  3  p.m.  ditto  at 

Pendlebury;  6  p.m.  ditto,  ditto. 
„      28. — Meeting  at  Walkden. 
,,      29. — Committee  in  Manchester  at  4.    Conference 

with  Oldham  branches  at  8. 

,,      30. — 12.45  midnight,  started  home.      Number  of 
letters  received  and  answered,  75. 

In  addition  he  had  his  " Labour  Leader''  articles  to 
write,  varying  from  four  to  a  dozen  columns  weekly.  How 
he  managed  to  accomplish  this  work  it  is  difficult  to  say. 
He  had  long  ago  acquired  the  faculty  of  being  able  to 
think  and  write  under  almost  any  circumstances,  and 
much  of  his  journalistic  work  was  done  in  third-class 
railway  compartments,  amongst  all  kinds  of  travelling 
companions;  but  even  so,  the  mental  and  physical  wear 
and  tear  must  have  been  most  exhausting,  not  to  speak 

135 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

of  the  irregularity  of  meals,  and  the  constant  change  of 
sleeping  accommodation.  Yet  he  had  never  a  grumble, 
and  every  new  host  or  hostess  found  him  cheerful 
and  smiling  and  ready  to  adapt  himself  to  every 
circumstance. 

During  June  of  this  year  he  spent  several  weeks  in 
South  Wales.  The  great  strike  of  the  Welsh  miners 
had  already  lasted  thirteen  weeks  and  there  were  no 
signs  of  a  termination.  The  miners'  demands  were  for 
a  twenty  per  cent,  increase,  the  establishment  of  a  mini- 
mum wage,  and  the  abolition  of  the  sliding  scale  by 
which  in  the  past  their  wages  had  been  regulated. 

Though  discouraged  by  their  own  official  leader, 
"Mabon,"  they  had  come  out  on  strike  to  the  number  of 
ninety  thousand  in  support  of  their  demands,  and  there 
was  privation  all  over  South  Wales.  By  a  coincidence, 
the  I.L.P.  associated  itself  with  the  miners'  revolt.  The 
South  Wales  I.L.P.  Federation  had  resolved  upon  a 
special  organising  campaign,  and  had  engaged  Mr. 
Willie  Wright,  a  well-known  propagandist,  to  carry 
through  the  work.  As  it  happened,  his  arrival  on  the 
scene  synchronised  with  the  outbreak,  and  as  most  of 
the  local  I.L.P.  men  were  involved  in  the  strike,  there  was 
nothing  for  him  to  do  but  throw  himself  into  the  struggle. 
If  he  could  not  form  I.L.P.  branches,  he  could  form 
relief  committees,  help  the  women  and  children,  stimu- 
late the  men,  and  through  the  columns  of  the  "Labour 
Leader"  make  known  to  the  Socialist  movement  through- 
out the  country  the  real  nature  and  consequences  of  the 
South  Wales  dispute.  This  he  did  most  effectually.  A 
"Labour  Leader"  relief  fund  was  raised,  committees 
formed  to  administer  it,  and  many  miners'  children  were 
thereby  saved  from  absolute  starvation. 

One  fact  in  connection  with  this  relief  fund  ought  to 
be  mentioned.       In  response  to  a  letter  from  Hardie, 

136 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

Mr.  Thomas  Lipton — now  Sir  Thomas — sent  a  sub- 
stantial quantity  of  provisions.  Hardie  had  refused  to 
make  use  of  Mr.  Andrew  Carnegie's  money  to  advance 
his  own  political  campaign  in  West  Ham,  but  when  it 
came  to  feeding  hungry  children,  no  rich  man's  money 
was  barred,  and  he  was  even  willing  to  become  a  sup- 
pliant on  their  behalf.  Nor  did  he  consider  his  free- 
dom of  action  restricted  thereby.  Shortly  afterwards 
he  was  exposing  Lipton  as  a  sweating  employer  in  a 
series  of  "White  Slaves"  articles  in  the  "Leader."  On 
the  question  at  issue  he  had  given  his  opinion  at  the 
beginning  of  the  dispute.  His  advice  was  that  the  men 
should  stand  firm  for  the  discarding  of  the  sliding  scale, 
and  that  they  should  as  quickly  as  possible  join  up  with 
the  British  Miners'  Federation,  and  he  spoke  scathingly 
of  the  Welsh  and  North  of  England  leaders  whose 
policy  kept  these  districts  isolated  from  each  other  and 
also  from  the  main  body,  thus  making  a  national  policy 
for  miners  impossible. 

When  he  visited  the  strike  area  in  June,  he  found  the 
military  there  before  him,  though  there  had  not  been  the 
slightest  indication  of  violence  or  law-breaking  on  the 
part  of  the  strikers.  At  some  of  his  meetings  the  sol- 
diers were  visibly  in  evidence,  while  at  others  they  were 
known  to  be  in  reserve  and  within  call  at  short  notice,  a 
state  of  matters  which  had  an  irritating  effect  upon  the 
workers,  especially  upon  the  women  folk,  and  on  several 
occasions  very  nearly  produced  the  result  which  the 
presence  of  the  military  was  supposed  to  avert.  The 
absence  of  rioting  during  this  dispute  was  certainly  not 
due  to  any  lack  of  incentive  on  the  part  of  the  authorities. 

In  his  public  utterances  Hardie  did  not  hide  his 
contempt  for  what  he  considered  to  be  the  timid  and 
temporising  attitude  of  the  miners'  representatives  in 
Parliament,  who  had  made  no  protest  against  the 

137 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

presence  of  the  soldiers  in  Wales,  and  who,  in  his 
opinion,  had  utterly  failed  to  make  use  of  their  parlia- 
mentary opportunities  on  behalf  of  the  men  on  strike. 
Probably  never  more  than  at  this  time  did  he  regret  his 
enforced  absence  from  the  House  of  Commons.  And, 
certainly,  looking  back  on  his  activities  during  the  Hull 
strike,  we  can  easily  imagine  how,  from  the  floor  of  St. 
Stephen's,  he  would  have  turned  the  eyes  of  the  whole 
country  towards  South  Wales,  especially  as  in  this  case 
he  would  have  been  fighting  for  his  own  craft  and 
speaking  of  conditions  concerning  which  he  had  practical 
knowledge.  The  Welshmen,  for  their  part,  did  not 
regard  him  as  a  stranger  or  outsider.  They  knew  him  to 
be  a  miner.  If  they  had  any  doubt,  his  homely  talk  soon 
dispelled  it.  They  had  not  forgotten  his  outspoken 
championship  in  connection  with  the  Albion  colliery 
disaster  a  few  years  previously,  while  the  touch  of 
religious  fervour  with  which  most  of  his  speeches  were 
warmed  was  very  much  to  their  liking.  He  addressed 
some  fourteen  or  fifteen  meetings,  mostly  in  the  Rhondda 
and  Merthyr  districts,  and  he  has  recorded  the  fact  that 
there  was  rain  at  all  these  meetings,  and  that  nearly 
every  day  he  got  wet  through.  In  the  Merthyr  district 
the  campaign  was  organised  by  the  active  spirits  of  the 
I.L.P.,  one  of  the  most  enthusiastic  of  these  being 
Llewellyn  Francis,  of  Penydarren,  whose  barber's  shop 
became  the  rendezvous  for  all  the  most  advanced  men, 
whose  assembling  together  provided  the  nucleus  of 
that  organisation  which,  two  years  later,  sent  Hardie 
once  more  to  Parliament  under  circumstances  which 
made  that  achievement  seem  almost  miraculous.  That 
this  ulterior  result  had  no  place  in  Hardie's  mind  will  be 
seen  when  we  come  to  describe  the  electoral  activities 
of  that  time. 
^  The  strike  ended  early  in  September  in  the  defeat  of 

138 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

the  men,  who  had  held  out  for  full  six  months.  But  it 
was  not  unfruitful  politically.  When  it  started  there 
were  no  more  than  half-a-dozen  branches  of  the  I. L. P. 
in  all  South  Wales.  When  it  finished  there  were  thirty- 
one,  some  of  them  with  upwards  of  two  hundred 
members. 

In  the  second  week  of  September  a  Conference  of  all 
the  I.L.P.  branches  in  the  Merthyr,  Dowlais,  and 
Troedyrhiew  Parliamentary  Division  was  held  in  the 
Welcome  Coffee  Tavern,  Merthyr,  with  David  Davies, 
railway  signalman,  in  the  chair.  Willie  Wright  was 
there  also,  as  witness  to  the  outcome  of  his  labours;  also 
Mr.  Robert  Williams,  F.R.I.B.A.,  an  architect  of  some 
distinction,  resident  in  London,  but  always  actively 
interested  in  the  welfare  of  his  native  Wales.  Mr. 
Williams  was  a  member  of  the  I.L.P.,  contributing 
occasionally  to  the  pages  of  the  ''Labour  Leader,"  and 
had  long  been  on  terms  of  personal  friendship  with 
Hardie.  During  the  strike  he  had  rendered  assistance, 
especially  in  the  organising  of  concerts  in  London  by 
a  Welsh  choir  on  behalf  of  the  relief  funds,  and  his  co- 
operation in  the  project  for  the  return  of  a  Socialist 
representative  had  therefore  considerable  weight  with 
the  miners.  At  this  Conference  the  resolve  was  taken 
that,  come  the  General  Election  when  it  might,  the 
Division  would  be  fought  for  Socialism.  From  that  day 
onward  the  preparations  for  a  contest  proceeded  apace. 

That  the  dissolution  of  Parliament  could  not  be  very 
far  away  was  the  general  opinion  in  political  circles,  and 
the  question  as  to  what  should  be  the  I.L.P.  plan  of  cam- 
paign was  giving  the  leaders  and  the  rank  and  file  much 
concern.  There  were  two  possible  policies.  Either  to 
encourage  the  branches  to  contest  seats  in  a  large  num- 
ber of  constituencies  and  make  the  General  Election 
a  national  propaganda  campaign  for  Socialism,  or  to 

139 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

contest  a  small  number  of  carefully-chosen  constitu- 
encies with  the  definite  purpose  of  getting  a  few  I.L.P. 
members  into  Parliament.  The  N.A.C.  favoured  the 
latter  policy  and  recommended  to  the  Annual  Confer- 
ence at  Leeds,  in  1899,  that  twenty-five  seats  should  be 
fought  and  all  the  finance  and  electoral  machinery  of  the 
Party  be  directed  towards  winning  these  seats.  This 
was  the  plan  agreed  upon,  but  of  course  the  advocates 
of  neither  the  one  policy  nor  the  other  could  foresee  the 
very  exceptional  conditions  under  which  the  election 
actually  did  take  place.  Hardie  himself  had  not  at  this 
time  been  selected  for  any  constituency.  He  had  been 
asked  to  allow  himself  to  be  nominated  again  for  West 
Ham,  where  there  was  every  reason  to  believe  he  would 
be  successful,  but  Will  T^torne  having  signified  his  inten- 
tion of  fighting  the  seat,  Hardie  abandoned  it  to  him, 
much  to  his  regret.  Thorne  was  subsequently  elected. 
This  year  took  place  what  was  known  as  the  "Over- 
toun  Exposure."  This,  though  in  perspective  occupying 
a  very  minor  place  in  Hardie's  life-work,  must  be 
referred  to  here  because  of  the  sensation  which  it  caused 
at  the  time,  the  heart-searchings  which  it  stimulated 
amongst  large  sections  of  sincerely  religious  people,  and 
the  striking  illustration  which  it  afforded  of  the  evils 
inseparable  from  modern  commercialism.  In  the  month 
of  April,  a  strike  occurred  amongst  the  labourers  in 
Shawfield  Chemical  Works,  at  Rutherglen,  near  Glas- 
gow. Had  the  demands  of  the  men,  which  were 
absurdly  moderate,  been  granted,  there  would  probably 
have  been  no  Overtoun  exposure.  They  were  refused, 
and  the  workers,  who  were  totally  unorganised,  solicited 
the  help  of  the  "Labour  Leader"  to  give  publicity  to 
their  grievances.  Inquiries  were  made  and  revealed 
very  grievous  conditions.  It  was  found  that  the  men 
had  to  work  twelve  hours  a  day  for  seven  days  a  week, 

140 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

and  that  without  any  meal  time;  that  the  wages  paid 
were  3d.  and  4d.  an  hour;  that  the  nature  of  the  work 
in  the  manufacture  of  chrome  potash  was  exceedingly 
injurious  to  the  health  of  the  workers,  producing 
virulent  and  incurable  skin  diseases,  and  affecting 
devastatingly  the  respiratory  and  digestive  organs ;  that 
there  was  no  attempt  by  the  management  to  provide 
adequate  protection  against  these  physical  evils;  and 
that  the  sanitary  arrangements  in  some  parts  of  the 
works  were  nil,  and  in  other  parts  limited  to  the  bare 
minimum  enjoined  by  law. 

The  head  of  the  firm  and  virtual  owner  was  Lord 
Overtoun,  a  gentleman  held  in  the  highest  esteem  in 
religious  and  philanthropic  circles  for  his  good  works. 
He  had  been  made  a  peer  in  recognition  of  his  "great 
worth  as  a  moral  and  religious  reformer."  His  esti- 
mated spendings  on  charity  amounted  to  £10,000  a  year. 
He  was  a  leading  light  in  the  councils  of  the  Free 
Church  of  Scotland,  and  was  himself  a  frequent  preacher 
of  the  "Gospel  of  Christ,"  He  was  a  noted  temperance 
reformer.  He  was  opposed  to  Sabbath  desecration,  and 
had  headed  deputations  in  opposition  to  the  running  of 
Sunday  trams  in  Glasgow.  In  politics  he  was  a  Liberal 
and  contributed  substantially  to  the  party  funds.  The 
"Labour  Leader,"  in  a  series  of  articles  which,  because 
of  the  controversy  created,  continued  for  several  months, 
depicted  these  two  contrasting  sets  of  facts.  The  cir- 
culation of  the  "Leader"  went  up  by  leaps  and  bounds. 
The  articles  were  reproduced  in  pamphlet  form  and  the 
sale  was  enormous.  Then  there  came  a  day  when  the 
printer  of  the  "Labour  Leader"  refused  to  print  any 
more  references  to  Lord  Overtoun,  and  the  paper 
appeared  with  a  blank  page,  save  for  an  explanatory 
note  by  David  Lowe,  the  managing  editor.  Another 
printer  was  got,  and  the  paper  came  out  the  following 

141 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

week  with  the  Overtoun  article  included.  An  inter- 
dict was  obtained  against  one  of  the  pamphlets  because 
of  a  personal  reference  to  a  certain  clergyman  who  had 
tried  to  defend  Lord  Overtoun.  The  offending  passage 
was  deleted,  and  the  pamphlet  went  out  to  meet  a 
demand  which  had  only  been  increased  by  the  attempt 
to  prevent  its  publication.  And  so  the  interest  kept  on 
growing — likewise  the  number  of  Har die's  friends  and 
enemies,  the  latter,  of  course,  attributing  to  him  the 
worst  of  motives,  and  in  some  cases  actually  construing 
his  action  as  an  attack  on  religion.  There  was  no 
possible  answer  to  the  exposure  except  that  which  placed 
religion  and  business  in  two  separate  compartments — 
an  answer  which  of  necessity  proved  the  contention 
of  the  Socialists  that  religion  and  capitalism  were 
incompatible. 

The  vindication  of  the  exposure  was  found  in  the 
fact  that  as  the  controversy  went  on  the  conditions  in- 
side Shawfield  Works  kept  improving.  Sunday  labour 
was  reduced  to  the  absolute  minimum  necessitated  by 
the  nature  of  the  trade,  better  sanitary  arrangements 
were  introduced  and  wages  in  some  degree  increased. 

By  the  time  this  local  agitation  had  come  to  an  end, 
something  had  happened  which  absorbed  the  attention 
of  the  whole  nation,  and  made  it  necessary  for  the 
British  Socialist  movement  to  define  its  attitude  towards 
British  imperialist  policy.  Great  Britain  was  at  war 
with  the  two  South  African  Republics. 


142 


CHAPTER  SEVEN 

THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  WAR MERTHYR  TYDVIL 

THE  history  of  the  South  African  War  has  been 
written  officially  from  the  standpoint  of  the  British 
Government    and    also    unofficially  by  various 
writers  who  do  not  all  agree  in  their  ascriptions  of  causes 
and  motives.    What  we  are  concerned  about  here  is  the 
attitude  of  the  I. L. P.  towards  the  war  and  the  part  played 
by  Keir  Hardie  during  that  time.  Happily  it  is  possible  to 
set  forth  the  I.L.P.  attitude  quite  clearly  without  much 
traversing  of  ground  which  is  covered  by  the  historians. 
On  September  gth,  1899,  five  weeks  before  the  out- 
break of  war,  the  National  Administrative  Council  of 
the  I.L.P.  met  at  Blackburn  and  adopted  the  following 
resolution,  equivalent  to  a  manifesto,    for    circulation 
amongst  its  branches  and  for  general  publication  : — 

"The  National  Administrative  Council  of  the  I.L.P. 
protests  against  the  manner  in  which  the  Government, 
by  the  tenor  of  their  dispatches  and  their  warlike  pre- 
parations', have  made  a  peaceful  settlement  difficult  with 
the  Transvaal  Republic. 

"The  policy  of  the  Government  can  be  explained  only 
on  the  supposition  that  their  intention  has  been  to  pro- 
voke a  war  of  conquest  to  secure  complete  control  in 
the  interests  of  unscrupulous  exploiters. 

"A  war  of  aggression  is,  under  any  circumstances,  an 
outrage  on  the  moral  sense  of  a  civilised  community  and 
in  the  present  instance  particularly  so,  considering  the 
sordid  character  of  the  real  objects  aimed  at. 

143 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

"It  is  especially  humiliating  to  the  democratic  instincts 
of  this  country  that  an  ulterior  and  unworthy  motive 
should  be  hidden  under  pretence  of  broadening  the 
political  liberties  of  the  Uitlanders.  Even  if  the  admitted 
grievances  of  the  Uitlanders  were  the  real  reason  of  the 
threatened  hostilities,  war  would  be  an  extreme  course 
quite  uncalled  for. 

"We  also  protest  against  the  action  of  the  press  and 
the  bulk  of  the  leading  politicians  in  strengthening  the 
criminal  conduct  of  the  Government  by  misleading  the 
public  and  rousing  the  passion  for  war,  and  we  express 
the  hope  that  it  may  not  yet  be  too  late  for  the  manhood 
of  the  nation  to  prevent  this  outrage  upon  the  conscience 
of  our  common  humanity/' 

This,  let  it  be  repeated,  was  five  weeks  before  the 
outbreak  of  war.  The  members  present  were  J.  Keir 
Hardie  (in  the  chair),  France  Littlewood,  J.  Bruce 
Glasier,  Philip  Snowden,  H.  Russell  Smart,  J.  Ramsay 
MacDonald,  James  Parker,  Joseph  Burgess  and  John 
Penny  (Secretary).  In  thus  definitely  and  uncompro- 
misingly setting  forth  the  I.L.P.  conception  of  the  causes 
of  the  war  and  the  Party's  policy  towards  ft,  the  N.A.C. 
took  a  step  which  decided,  amongst  other  things,  that 
for  several  years  to  come  the  I.L.P.  would  be  the  most 
unpopular  Party  and  its  adherents  and  leaders  the  most 
bitterly  abused  persons  in  the  country.  The  Liberal 
Party  escaped  this  odium  by  reason  of  the  fact  that  having 
no  alternative  policy,  it  virtually  acquiesced  in  the  war, 
while  criticising  the  diplomacy  which  had  brought  it 
about.  Some  few  men  there  were  in  both  of  the  orthodox 
parties  who  rose  above  party  and  even  above  class 
interests.  Sir  Edward  Clarke,  Q.C.,  one  of  the  ablest 
of  Tories,  and  destined  in  the  ordinary  course  of  events 
to  reach  the  Woolsack,  openly  opposed  the  Government 
policy  and  sacrificed  the  remainder  of  his  political  life 

144 


SOUTH  AFRICAN  WAR 

rather  than  be  a  consenting  party  to  what  he  described 
as  an  absolutely  unnecessary  war  caused  by  diplomatic 
blundering,  the  real  responsibility  for  which,  he  declared, 
"rested  upon  Mr.  Chamberlain  and  Sir  Alfred  Milner." 
On  the  Liberal  side,  Sir  Robert  Reid  (now  Lord  Lore- 
burn),  Mr.  James  Bryce,  Mr.  John  Morley,  Mr.  Lloyd 
George  and  Mr.  John  Burns  spoke  out  strongly,    but 
their  utterances  were  more  than  counterbalanced  by  the 
Imperialistic  declarations  of  Lord  Rosebery,  Sir  Edward 
Grey  and  Mr.  Asquith,  the  real  mouthpieces  of  official 
Liberalism.      Sir   William    Harcourt    and    Sir    Henry 
Campbell-Bannerman  at  the  beginning  blew  neither  hot 
nor  cold.   Inside  the  House  of  Commons,  the  only  defin- 
ite opposition  came  from  the  Irish  Party.    Outside  in  the 
country,  the  only  British  political  parties  opposing  the 
war  policy  were  the  I .  L .  P .  and  the  S .  D .  F . ,  parties  with- 
out a  single  representative  in  Parliament.     The  press, 
with  the  exception  of  the  "Morning  Leader/5  the  "Man- 
chester Guardian,"  the  "Edinburgh  Evening  News/' 
and  Mr.  Stead's  monthly,  "Review  of  Reviews,"  was 
wholly  with  the  Government,  and  soon  succeeded  making 
the  war  thoroughly  popular  with  the  masses  and  in  creat- 
ing an  environment  of  intolerance  in  which  free  speech 
was  well-nigh  impossible.     To  Hardie  and  the  other 
I.L.P.  leaders  it  was  a  source  of  satisfaction  to  find  that 
they  had  the  support  of  the  rank  and  file  membership. 
Indeed,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  membership  of 
the  I.L.P.  constituted  the  only  section  of  the  community 
that   was   well   informed   concerning   the   questions   at 
issue.     South  African  affairs  had  received  special  atten- 
tion in  the  "Labour  Leader,"  and  latterly,  a  series  of 
articles  signed  "Kopje,"  which  was  the  nom  de  plume 
of  an  exceedingly  capable  South  African  journalist,  pro- 
vided the  readers  of  Hardie's  paper  with  an  account  of 
the  doings  of  the  Chartered    Company's    agents    and 

145 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

officials  as  viewed  through  other  glasses  than  those  of  the 
Imperialist  or  the  gold  seeker,  and  described  the  develop- 
ment of  the  Cecil  Rhodes'  policy  as  it  affected  the 
natives,  the  Boer  farmers  and  the  Chartered  Company's 
white  employees,  otherwise  known  as  Uitlanders.  Other 
writers  in  the  same  paper  had  turned  a  somewhat 
piercing  searchlight  upon  the  share  lists  of  the  Chartered 
Company  and  De  Beers  Ltd.,  and  upon  the  manner  in 
which  influential  members  of  these  companies  with  high 
social  status  in  this  country  were  in  a  position  to  influence 
the  colonial  policy,  of  the  Government,  itself  well 
impregnated  with  Imperialist  tendencies.  I.L.P. 
members  were  therefore  quite  able  to  distinguish  between 
the  ostensible  and  the  real  causes  of  the  war.  They  did 
not  believe  that  it  was  a  war  to  right  the  wrongs  of  the 
Uitlanders.  They  did  not  believe  that  the  military 
power  of  Great  Britain  was  being  used  merely  to  estab- 
lish franchise  rights  in  the  Transvaal  which  had  been 
refused  to  the  people  at  home  for  half  a  century  and  were 
still  withheld  from  womenfolk  in  this  country.  They  did 
believe  that  already  the  process  of  fusion  between  the 
Dutch  settlers  and  the  British  incomers  had  begun,  and 
would,  in  course  of  time  quite  measurable,  complete 
itself  through  intermarriage,  social  intercourse  and 
mutual  interest.  They  knew  something  about  the 
diamond  mines  and  the  gold  mines,  the  De  Beers'  com- 
pounds and  the  forced  native  labour,  and  they  believed 
with  their  National  Executive  that  the  war  was  a  "war 
of  conquest  to  secure  complete  control  of  the  Transvaal 
in  the  interests  of  unscrupulous  exploiters."  When 
Hardie,  Glasier,  MacDonald,  Snowden  and  the  other 
leaders  declared  wholeheartedly  against  the  war,  it  was 
with  the  knowledge  that  they  had  their  people  behind 
them,  few  in  numbers  comparatively,  but  dependable 
and  stout  of  heart. 


SOUTH  AFRICAN  WAR 

To  the  I.L.P.,  however,  the  struggle  raised  a 
question  much  greater  than  whether  Boer  or  Briton 
would  rule  in  South  Africa.  It  involved  matters 
materially  affecting  the  process  of  world  development 
towards  Socialism.  Hardie  expressed  this  view  with 
much  clearness.  "In  the  transition  stage,"  he  said, 
"from  commercialism  to  Socialism,  there  must  needs  be 
much  suffering.  All  new  births  are  the  outcome  of  pain 
and  sorrow.  It  was  so  when  England  passed  from  the 
pastoral  into  the  commercial  stage.  So,  too,  when  the 
machines  began  to  displace  the  hand,  and  the  factory 
the  cottage  forms  of  industry.  For  two  generations 
there  were  want  and  woe  in  the  land.  So,  too,  must 
it  be  when  the  change  from  production  for  profit  to  pro- 
duction for  use  is  made.  A  great  and  extended  Empire 
lengthens  the  period  required  for  the  change  and  thus 
prolongs  the  misery,  and  it  follows  that  the  loss  of 
Empire  would  hasten  the  advent  of  Socialism.  The 
greater  the  Empire  the  greater  the  military  expenditure 
and  the  harder  the  lot  of  the  workers.  Modern 
imperialism  is,  in  fact,  to  the  Socialist,  simply  capital- 
ism  in  its  most  predatory  and  militant  phase." 

Such  reasoning  was  incomprehensible  to  a  populace 
whose  mentality  seemed  to  be  well  expressed  by  Lord 
Carrington,  when  he  said :  "We  must  all  stop  thinking 
till  the  war  is  over,"  a  condition  of  mind  certainly  very 
essential  to  the  maintenance  of  the  war  spirit.  The 
British  nation,  however,  was  not  allowed  to  stop  thinking 
for  long.  This  war,  like  all  other  wars,  did  not  go 
according  to  plan.  It  began  in  October.  By  Christmas 
Day  Methuen  had  been  defeated  at  Modderfontein.  An 
entire  British  regiment  had  laid  down  its  arms.  General 
White  was  besieged  in  Ladysmith.  Cecil  Rhodes,  in 
whom  was  personified  the  capitalist  interests  at  stake, 
was  in  danger  of  capture  at  Kimberley,  and  General 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Roberts  was  on  order  for  the  seat  of  war  (with  Kitchener 
soon  to  follow),  and  ever  more  troops  were  being 
drafted  out. 

In  face  of  these  realities  the  jingo  fever  temporarily 
cooled  down,  and  in  the  slightly  saner  atmosphere  other 
people  than  the  Socialists  began  to  consider  whether  a 
movement  for  peace  could  not  now  be  started.  On 
Christmas  Eve,  Silas  Hocking,  the  novelist,  writing 
from  the  National  Liberal  Club,  sent  out  the  following 
letter  to  the  press  : — 

"Sir, — There  are  many  people  who  think,  with  my- 
self,   that   the   time   has   come   when   some   organised 
attempt  should  be  made  by  those  who  believe  in  the 
New  Testament  to  put  a  stop  to  the  inhuman  slaughter 
that  is  going  on  in  South  Africa — a  slaughter  that  is  not 
only    a  disgrace    to  civilisation,  but  which    brings  our 
Christianity  into  utter  contempt.    Surely  sufficient  blood 
has    been    shed.        No  one  can  any    longer  doubt  the 
courage  or  the  skill  of  either  of    the  combatants,  but 
why  prolong  the  strife?       Cannot  we  in  the  name  of 
the  Prince  of  Peace  cry  'Halt !'  and  seek  some  peaceful 
settlement  of  the  questions  in  dispute  ?    As  the  greater, 
and  as  we  think  the  more  Christian,  nation  we  should 
cover  ourselves  with  honour  in  asking  for  an  armistice 
and  seeking  a  settlement  by  peaceful  means.    We  can 
win  no  honour  by  fighting,  whatever  the  issues  may  be. 
In  order  to  test  the  extent  of  the  feeling  to  which  I  have 
given , expression  and  with  a  view  to  holding  a  confer- 
ence in  London  at  an  early  date,  I  shall  be  willing  to 
receive  the  names  of  any  who    may  be  willing  to  co- 
operate." 

Canon  Scott  Holland,  preaching  in  St.  Paul's  Cathe- 
dral, sounded  an  even  higher  note.  "We  should 
humiliate  ourselves  for  the  blundering  recklessness  with 
which  we  entered  on  the  war,  and  the  insolence  and 

148 


SOUTH  AFRICAN  WAR 

arrogance  which  blinded  us  so  utterly.  Let  there  be 
no  more  vain-glory,  no  more  braggart  tongues,  and  let 
us  at  the  beginning  of  the  New  Year  find  our  true  under- 
standing." As  an  immediate  result  of  these  appeals 
and  the  conference  which  followed,  the  "National  Stop- 
the-War  Committee"  was  brought  into  existence.  This, 
with  its  auxiliary  committees  throughout  the  country, 
organised  huge  peace  demonstrations  in  most  of  the  big 
centres  of  industry  during  the  winter.  In  nearly  every 
case  these  demonstrations  had  to  fight  against  organised 
hooliganism  stimulated  by  the  jingo  press  and  the 
jingo  music  halls,  and  inflamed  to  delirious  passion  as 
the  tide  of  war  began  to  turn  and  the  news  of  British 
victories  came  across  the  wires. 

The  I.L.P.  naturally  associated  itself  prominently 
with  this  Stop-the-War  movement,  and  its  leaders, 
especially  Hardie  as  the  recognised  "head  and  front  of 
the  offending,"  had  directed  against  them,  not  only  the 
virulence  of  the  war  press,  but  frequently  the  unre- 
strained violence  of  the  mob — unrestrained,  at  least,  by 
the  official  maintainers  of  Law  and  Order,  though 
voluntary  bodyguards  were  soon  forthcoming,  and  the 
physical  force  patriots  learned,  some  of  them  to  their 
cost — as  they  were  taught  again  some  years  later — that 
the  advocates  of  peace  were,  on  occasion,  capable  of 
meeting  force  with  force.  In  spite  of  all  the  brawling 
intimidation  of  the  war  party,  many  successful  demon- 
strations were  held.  At  Leeds,  Manchester,  York, 
Birmingham,  Glasgow,  Edinburgh  and  various  other 
places,  the  advocates  for  a  peaceful  settlement  on 
honourable  terms  were  able  to  get  a  hearing,  and  the 
very  violence  of  the  opposition  secured  for  them  some 
press  attention,  which,  though  mostly  derisive,  adver- 
tised the  purposes  of  the  movement.  The  Glasgow 
meeting  was  probably  typical  of  the  others.  It  was 

L  149 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

organised  by  a  local  committee  of  which  David 
Lowe,  of  the  "Labour  Leader,"  was  secretary.  The 
chairman  was  Baillie  John  Ferguson,  of  the  Liberal 
Association.  The  speakers  were  Mr.  Cronwright 
Schreiner,  of  the  Cape  Parliament,  Mr.  Lloyd 
George,  and  Mr.  K.  J.  Wilson. 

Keir  Hardie,  Robert  Smillie,  Joseph  Burgess,  W.  M. 
Haddow  and  prominent  local  I.L.P.  men  were  present, 
not  as  speakers,  but  as  directors  of  the  defending 
forces.  The  preparations  were  as  for  a  pitched  battle. 
Before  the  doors  were  opened  to  the  public,  the  hall  was 
nearly  filled  with  assured  supporters.  Outside  there 
was  an  expectant  mob  of  many  thousands,  conspicuous 
amongst  them  being  University  students  and  habitues 
of  Glasgow  Clubland,  and  when  at  last  the  doors  were 
opened  there  was  a  mad  rush  as  of  stampeded  wild 
cattle.  Only  a  limited  number  got  through  the  defences, 
and  many  heads  were  broken  in  the  attempt.  Inside 
the  hall,  the  meeting  went  on.  In  the  stairways  and 
corridors,  and  at  the  back  of  the  area,  the  battle  raged. 
The  police,  whose  headquarters  were  next  door,  held 
aloof  with  a  serene  impartiality  equivalent  to  an  encour- 
agement to  riot,  until  towards  the  end,  by  orders  of  the 
Sheriff,  and  to  save  the  hall  property  from  being 
wrecked,  they  were  compelled  to  come  into  action.  The 
meetifag,  however,  was  held.  Lloyd  George  escaped 
unscathed,  thanks  to  Socialist  protection,  and,  as  history 
tells,  lived  to  become  the  War  Spirit's  most  blind  and 
excellent  instrument.  The  following  week  at  Dundee 
and  Edinburgh  similar  scenes  were  enacted,  and 
Hardie,  who  was  the  principal  speaker,  was  only  saved 
from  maltreatment  by  a  Glasgow  bodyguard  that 
attended  him  at  these  places.  It  was  a  fine,  exhilarating 
fighting  time. 

But  Hardie  at  this  time  was  doing  better  work  than 

150 


SOUTH  AFRICAN  WAR 

at  peace  demonstrations.  He  was  wielding  his  pen  with 
a  skill  and  prowess  such  as  he  had  never  exhibited 
before,  and  with  the  possession  of  which  he  has  not  even 
yet  been  credited,  so  much  has  it  been  the  habit  to  regard 
him  either  as  a  mob  orator  or  as  a  parliamentary 
extremist.  A  perusal  of  the  files  of  the  "Labour 
Leader"  for  this  period  will  reveal  Hardie  as  a  writer, 
the  reverse  of  declamatory  and  devoid  of  those  florid 
superficialities  common  to  controversial  journalism. 

An  article  under  the  heading  of  "A  Capitalist  War," 
which  he  contributed  to  "L'Humanite  Nouvelle,"  and 
which  was  reproduced  in  the  "Leader,"  is  perhaps  as 
fine  an  example  of  compressed  but  accurate  historical 
writing  as  is  to  be  found  anywhere.     It  traces,  step  by 
step,  the  development  of  South  Africa  from  the  first 
Dutch  settlement  down  through  the    successive  treks, 
the  founding  of  the  Dutch  Republics,  the  discovery  of 
the  gold  fields,  and    the    consequent  incursion    of  the 
speculators  and  exploiters,  involving  the  British  Govern- 
ment in  their  adventures,  and  steadily  as    fate  driving 
the  Boers  into  a  corner  in  which  they  must  either  fight, 
or  surrender  their  national  existence.      He  verifies  all 
his    statements,    produces    his    facts    and    authorities, 
draws     comparisons     between     ancient     and     modern 
imperialism,  and  sums  up  his  argument  with  a  literary 
skill  all  the  more  effective  because  it  is  unaffected  and 
does  not  pretend  to  be  literary.       This  was    his  con- 
clusion :  "The  war  is    a  capitalist  war.       The    British 
merchant  hopes  to  secure  markets  for  his  goods,  the 
investor  an  outlet  for  his  capital,  the  speculator  more 
fools  out  of  whom  to  make  money,  and  the  mining  com- 
panies cheaper  labour  and  increased  dividends.       We 
are  told  it  is  to  spread  freedom  and  to  extend  the  rights 
and  liberties  of  the  common  people.     When  we  find  a 
Conservative    Government   expending   the    blood   and 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

treasure  of  the  nation  to  extend  the  rights  and  liberties 
of  the  common  people,  we  may  well  pause  and  begin 
to  think."  The  latent  unforced  sarcasm  of  that  last 
sentence  is  characteristic  of  a  literary  style  which  is  not 
dependent  upon  expletives  or  invective  for  its  strength. 

At  this  high  level  he  kept  writing  all  through  the  war, 
reviewing  Bryce's  "Impressions  of  South  Africa"  or 
J.  A.  Hobson's  "The  War  in  South  Africa,"  criticising 
the  supineness  of  the  Liberal  Party,  examining  the 
.Government's  defence  of  its  policy  and  exposing  its 
evasions,  and  commenting  upon  the  incidents  of  the  war 
with  a  wealth  of  argument,  illustration  and  appeal, 
directed  always  to  the  one  conclusion,  that  the  war  must 
be  stopped.  The  pity  of  it  was,  that  all  this  fine  work 
was  limited  in  its  effect,  and  never  reached  the  people 
who  could  have  most  profited  by  it. 

The  "Labour  Leader,"  of  course,  shared  in  the 
unpopularity  of  its  editor  and  its  party,  and  the  circula- 
tion declined^  thereby  circumscribing  the  scope  of  its 
.^nfluence.  The  lack  of  a  newspaper  press  capable  of 
competing  with  the  lavishly  financed  journalism  of  the 
vested  interests  has  always  been  the  chief  handicap  of 
the  Socialist  movement.  Had  Hardie  been  possessed 
of  a  publicity  organisation  such  as  has  always  been  at 
the  service  of  the  leaders  of  other  political  parties,  his 
worth  would  have  been  recognised  much  earlier,  his 
influence  in  his  lifetime  would  have  been  greater,  and 
some  more  important  person  than  the  present  writer 
would  be  at  work  on  his  biography.  It  was  the  same 
lack  of  a  publicity  medium  that  made  it  necessary  for 
the  I.L.P.  to  have  its  anti-war  manifesto  placarded  on 
walls  throughout  the  country.  There  was  no  other 
method  of  proclaiming  its  views  on  a  national  scale,  and 
even  this  was  not  very  effective,  as  in  many  places  the 
bills  wert  torn  down  almost  as  soon  as  they  were  posted. 

152 


LABOUR  PARTY 

Amid  all  this  war  controversy  and  tumult,  the  politi- 
cal education  and  organisation  of  labour  moved  quietly  * 
forward.  This  year  was  formed  the  Labour  Representa- 
tion Committee,  which  became  the  Labour  Party  of  the 
present  day,  and  now  challenges  the  other  political 
parties  for  control  of  the  government  of  the  nation. 

The  first  step  was  taken  in  Scotland.  On  Saturday, 
January  6th,  1900,  what  was  described  as  "the 
most  important  Labour  Conference  ever  held  in 
Scotland,"  met  in  the  Free  Gardeners'  Hall,  Picardy 
Place,  Edinburgh,  when  two  hundred  and  twenty-six 
delegates  came  together  for  the  purpose  of  agreeing  upon 
a  common  ground  of  political  action  and  of  formulating 
a  programme  of  social  measures  upon  which  all  sections 
of  the  workers  might  unite.  Robert  Smillie  was  in  the 
chair,  and  amongst  those  on  the  platform  were  Keir 
Hardie  of  Cumnock,  Joseph  Burgess  and  Martin  Haddow 
of  Glasgow,  Robert  Allan  of  Edinburgh,  John  Carnegie 
of  Dundee,  John  Keir  of  Aberdeen,  with  John  Penny, 
Bruce  Glasier  and  Russell  Smart  holding  a  watching 
brief  for  the  I. L. P.  National  Council.  As  this  meeting 
is,  in  a  sense,  historical,  it  may  be  well  to  place  on  record 
its  composition.  Trade  Unions  sent  one  hundred  and 
sixteen  delegates.  Trades  Councils  twenty-nine,  Co- 
operative organisations  twenty-eight,  Independent 
Labour  Party  branches  thirty-four,  Social  Democratic 
Federation  branches  nineteen.  The  acting  Secretary 
was  George  Carson  of  Glasgow,  whose  activities 
in  the  formation  of  the  Scottish  Trades  Union  Con- 
gress, in  1897,  nad  brought  him  in  close  touch  with  every 
section  of  organised  labour  in  Scotland,  and  this 
connection  he  now  utilised  in  getting  the  present  Con- 
ference together.  Smillie,  in  his  brief  remarks  as 
Chairman,  went  as  usual  straight  to  the  root  of  the 
matter.  :<They  had  had  enough  of  party  trimming  and 

153 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

sham  fighting,  and  were  determined  to  be  done  with  that 
once  for  all  and  have  Independent  Labour  representa- 
tion." The  following  resolution  was  adopted  :  "Recog- 
nising that  no  real  progress  has  been  made  with  those 
important  measures  of  social  and  industrial  reform  that 
are  necessary  for  the  comfort  and  well-being  of  the  work- 
ing classes,  and  further  recognising  that  neither  of  the 
two  parties  can  or  will  effect  these  reforms,  this  Confer- 
ence is  of  the  opinion  that  the  only  means  by  which  such 
reforms  can  be  obtained  is  by  having  direct  independent 
working-class  representation  in  the  House  of  Commons 
and  on  local  administrative  bodies,  and  hereby  pledges 
itself  to  secure  that  end  as  a  logical  sequence  to  the 
possession  of  political  power  by  the  working  classes." 

An  amendment  to  strike  out  the  word  "independent" 
was  defeated  by  a  large  majority,  as  was  also  another 
amendment  to  define  the  object  of  the  Conference  as 
being  "to  secure  the  nationalisation  of  the  means  of 
production,  distribution  and  exchange."  The  Confer- 
ence, it  will  thus  be  seen,  while  breaking  completely  with 
the  political  traditions  of  the  past,  refrained  from  identi- 
fying itself  with  Socialism.  It  was  a  Labour  Representa- 
tion Conference,  that,  and  nothing  more.  There  is  no 
need  to  detail  the  other  proceedings  of  the  Conference, 
as  its  decisions  and  the  organising  machinery  which  it 
outlined  were,  for  the  most  part,  incorporated  in  the 
programme  and  constitution  of  the  larger  national  Con- 
ference which  was  held  in  London  in  the  following 
month,  but  it  will  be  agreed  that  an  account  of  the 
Labour  Party  movement  would  be  incomplete,  if  it 
failed  to  take  note  of  this  rather  notable  Scottish 
gathering. 

The  date  of  the  British  Conference  was  February  27th, 
1900,  the  place  of  meeting  the  Memorial  Hall,  London. 
It  was  the  outcome  of  a  resolution  passed  by  the  Trades 

154 


LABOUR  PARTY 

Congress  the  previous  year,  which  itself  was  the  culmin- 
ating sequel  to  the  many  debates  initiated  by  Hardie  on 
the  floor  of  the  Congress  in  bygone  years.  On  this 
occasion,  however,  the  Congress,  instead  of  remitting 
the  matter  to  the  Parliamentary  Committee,  had 
instructed  that  Committee  to  co-operate  with  the  Inde- 
pendent Labour  Party  and  other  Socialist  bodies.  This 
joint  Committee  was  duly  appointed,  and  requested 
J.  Ramsay  MacDonald  to  draft  a  constitution  for  the  new 
Party — a  wise  proceeding  which  enabled  the  Conference, 
with  the  minimum  amount  of  friction,  to  achieve  the 
purpose  for  which  it  had  been  called. 

The  proceedings  of  this  memorable  meeting  are  chroni- 
cled in  the  official  report  and  also  in  A.  W.  Humphrey's 
admirable  "History  of  Labour  Representation."  What 
we  are  concerned  with  here  is  the  part  which  Hardie 
played  in  the  Conference.  He  was  perhaps  more  deeply 
interested  in  its  success  than  any  delegate  present.  It 
was  for  this,  the  political  consolidation  of  organised 
labour,  that  he  had  given  the  greater  part  of  his  life, 
and  although  he  knew  well  that  this  was  not  the  end, 
but  only  the  essential  means  to  the  end,  namely,  labour's 
conquest  of  political  power,  for  that  very  reason  he  was 
keenly  alive  to  the  possibility  of  failure  at  this  particular 
juncture.  Against  any  such  mischance  he  was  watchfully 
on  guard.  The  danger  of  a  breakdown  lay  in  the 
different,  almost  antagonistic,  conceptions  of  what  should 
be  the  composition  and  function  of  a  Parliamentary 
Labour  Party*  held  by  certain  Trade  Union  sections  and 
by  certain  Socialist  sections.  The  question  of  the  forma- 
tion of  a  Labour  group  in  Parliament  was  the  danger 
point.  Against  a  proposal  by  James  Macdonald  of  the 
S.D.F.  that  Socialism  be  adopted  as  a  test  for  Labour 
candidates,  an  amendment  by  Wilkie  of  the  Shipwrights 
making  a  selected  programme  the  basis  and  leaving  the 

155 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

members  free  outside  the  items  which  it  contained,  had 
been  carried  after  a  somewhat  acrimonious  debate. 

This  was  altogther  too  loose  and  indefinite,  and  Hardie 
J  intervened  with  a  resolution  in  favour  of  establishing 
a  distinct  Labour  group  in  Parliament,  which  should 
have  its  own  whips  and  agree  upon  a  policy  embracing 
a  readiness  to  co-operate  with  any  party  which,  for  the 
time  being,  might  be  engaged  in  promoting  legislation 
in  the  distinct  interest  of  Labour,  and,  conversely, 
to  associate  itself  with  any  party  in  opposing 
measures  having  an  opposite  tendency;  and  further, 
no  member  of  the  Labour  group  should  oppose  a 
candidate  whose  candidature  was  promoted  by  any 
organisation  coming  within  the  scope  of  Resolution 
No.  i .  Wilkie  withdrew  his  proposal  and  Hardie's  resolu- 
tion became  the  finding  of  the  Conference.  Its  virtue 
lay  in  the  fact  that  it  committed  the  delegates,  Socialist 
and  Trade  Unionist  alike,  to  the  formation  of  an  Inde- 
pendent Parliamentary  Labour  group,  and  also  provided 
that  temporary  alliances  with  other  parties  should  be 
determined,  not  by  the  individual  members,  but  by  the 
group  itself  acting  as  a  unit.  Probably  these  disciplinary 
implications  were  not  fully  grasped  by  some  of  the  Trade 
Unionists,  but  that  was  not  Hardie's  fault.  He  never 
at  any  time  wilfully  left  his  meaning  in  doubt,  either  to 
the  one  section  or  the  other.  He  was  a  Socialist,  but 
this  was  not  a  Socialist  Conference,  and  even  if  it  had 
been  possible  by  a  majority  vote  to  make  it  so,  that  would 
have  been  an  unfair  departure  from  the  purpose  for 
which  it  was  called.  The  one  thing  to  do  at  diat  moment 
was  to  make  Labour  Representation  a  fact.  '  "The  object 
of  the  Conference,"  he  said,  referring  to  "the  S.D.F. 
resolution,  "was  not  to  discuss  first  principles,  but  to 
ascertain  whether  organisations  representing  different 
ideals  could  find  an  immediate  and  common  ground  of 

156 


LABOUR  PARTY 

action,  leaving  each  organisation  free  to  maintain  and 
propagate  its  own  theory  in  its  own  way;  the  object  of 
the  Conference  was  to  secure  a  united  Labour  vote 
in  support  of  Labour  candidates  and  co-operation 
amongst  them  on  Labour  questions  when  returned." 
In  this  way,  and  on  that  basis,  the  L.R.C.,  as  it  was 
familiarly  called,  came  into  being.  ""7 

The  first  Chairman  was  F.  W.  Rogers,  of  the  Vellum 
Binders'  Union,  who  will  be  chiefly  remembered  for  his 
persistent  pioneering  of  the  Old  Age  Pension  move- 
ment. The  first  Treasurer  was  Richard  Bell,  of  the 
Railway  Servants.  The  I.L.P.  delegates  on  the  first 
Executive  were  Keir  Hardie  and  James  Parker.  The 
S.D.F.  were  represented  by  Harry  Quelch  and  James 
Macdonald,  and  the  Fabian  Society  by  E.  R.  Pease. 
Thus  all  the  Socialist  sections  had  a  place  in  the 
councils  of  the  new  Party,  though  the  S.D.F.  seceded 
later.  The  Secretaryship  was  placed  in  the  capable 
hands  of  J.  R.  MacDonald,  to  whose  appointment  was 
undoubtedly  due  the  immediate  recognition  of  the 
L.R.C.  as  a  new  vital  force  in  British  political  life. 

Easter  week  brought  the  Eighth  Annual  Conference 
of  the  Independent  Labour  Party  (held  this  year  in 
Glasgow),  an  event  which  has  its  chief  biographical 
interest  in  that  it  marked  Hardie's  retirement  from  the 
Chairmanship  which  he  had  held  uninterruptedly  since 
the  formation  of  the  Party.  The  delegates  seized  the 
opportunity  to  mark  their  high  esteem  and  deep  affec- 
tion for  the  man  whom  all  recognised  as  their  leader. 
During  the  session  the  business  was  suspended  in  order 
to  present  him  with  an  address  wherein  it  was  sought 
to  express  "with  gratitude  and  pride  our  recognition  of 
the  great  services  he  has  rendered  the  Independent 
Labour  Party  and  the  national  cause  of  Labour  and 
Socialism/*  J.  Bruce  Glasier,  his  successor  in  the 

157 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Chairmanship,  in  moving  the  resolution,  made  a  speech 
which  is  here  reproduced  because  in  some  measure  it 
reflects  characteristics  common  to  both  men,  and  also 
because  it  indicates,  in  a  manner  which  no  amount  of 
biographical  detail  can  equal,  the  character  of  the  work 
which  had  gained  for  Hardie  so  abiding  a  place  in  the 
hearts  of  the  rank  and  file  of  the  Party.    '  *  I  have  claimed 
of  my  comrades  of  the  N.A.C.,"  said  Glasier,     "the 
privilege  of  moving  this  address  as  one  of  Keir  Hardie's 
oldest  personal  friends  and  colleagues  in  the  Socialist 
movement,  and  also  as  a  fellow-Scotsman.     It  is  with 
some  emotion  that  I  look  back  on  the  early  days  of  my 
association  with  him,  and  consider  how  much  has  hap- 
pened since  then  to  forward  the  Socialist  cause  in  our 
country.     In  those  early  days  many  of  us  doubted  the 
wisdom  of  his  political  policy  as  we  have  not  infrequently 
since  had  occasion  to  differ  from  him,    but    in    most 
instances  events  have  shown  that  his  wisdom  was  greater 
than  any  of  ours.    In  connection  with  the  political  issues 
before  our  Party  and  the  country,  Keir  Hardie  has  dis- 
played a  truly  marvellous  insight,  I  would  almost  venture 
to  say  second-sight,  for  indeed  I  do  not  doubt  that  Keir 
Hardie  is  gifted  with  at  least  a  touch  of  that  miraculous 
and  peculiarly  Scottish  endowment.  In  the  House  of  Com- 
mons and  in  the  country  he  has  established  a  tradition 
of  leadership  which  is  one  of  the  greatest  possessions 
of  the  Socialist  and  Labour  movement  in  Britain.     His 
rocklike  steadfastness,  his  unceasing  toil,  his  persisting 
and  absolute  faith  in  the  policy  of  his  party,  are  qualities 
in  which  he  is  unexcelled  by  any  political  leader  of  our 
time.     He  has  never  failed  us.     Many  have  come  and 
gone,  but  he  is  with  us  to-day  as  certainly  as  in  the  day 
when  the  I.L.P.  was  formed.     By  day  and  by  night, 
often  weary  an3  often  wet,  he  has  trudged  from  town 
to  city  in  every  corner  of  the  land  bearing  witness  to  the 

158 


LABOUR  PARTY 

cause  of  Socialism  and  sturdily  vindicating  the  cause  of 
Independent  Labour  Representation.  He  has  not  stood 
aloof  from  his  comrades,  but  has  constantly  been  in  touch 
with  the  working  men  and  women  of  our  movement  as 
an  every-day  friend  and  fellow-worker.  He  has  dwelt 
in  their  houses  and  chatted  by  their  firesides,  and  has 
warmed  many  a  heart  by  the  glow  of  his  sympathy  and 
companionship.  The  wear  and  tear  of  these  many  years 
of  propaganda  have  told  somewhat  on  the  strength  of 
our  comrade,  but  he  has  never  complained  of  his  task 
nor  has  he  grown  fretful  with  the  people  or  their  cause. 
On  the  N.A.C.  his  colleagues  are  deeply  attached  to  him. 
He  is  always  most  amenable  to  discussion  with  them. 
They  do  not  always  agree  with  his  views,  but  they  have 
been  taught  by  experience  to  doubt  their  own  judgment 
not  once,  but  twice  and  thrice,  when  it  came  into 
conflict  with  his.  But  I  must  not  detain  you  with  this 
ineffectual  effort  to  express  what  I  feel.  I  shall  venture 
only  one  word  more.  Hardly  in  modern  times  has  a 
man  arisen  from  the  people,  who,  unattracted  by  the 
enticements  of  wealth  or  pleasure  and  unbent  either  by 
praise  or  abuse,  has  remained  so  faithful  to  the  class 
to  which  he  belongs.  His  career  is  a  promise  and  a  sign 
of  the  uprising  of  an  intensely  earnest,  capable  and  self- 
reliant  democracy.  He  is  a  man  of  the  people  and  a 
leader  of  the  people." 

These  words,  be  it  remembered,  were  spoken  when 
the  I.L.P.  was  passing  through  its  darkest  hours,  when 
its  teachings  were  unpopular  and  its  adherents  marked 
down  as  political  Ishmaelites,  and  when  militarism  was 
rampant  in  the  country;  and  their  utterance  at  such  a 
time  indicates  that  not  only  Keir  Hardie,  but  his  col- 
leagues and  followers,  were  endowed  with  great  faith 
and  great  courage,  and  explains  how  it  is  that  the  I.L.P. 
has  survived  through  all  the  succeeding  years.  Hardie, 

159 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

of  course,  remained  on  the  National  Council,  and  his 
personality  continued  to  reflect  itself  in  every  phase  and 
aspect  of  the  movement. 

This  Conference,  which  was  the  first  since  the  out- 
break of  war,  confirmed  and  reaffirmed  absolutely  the 
anti-Imperialist  policy  of  the  National  Council,  already 
spontaneously  approved  and  supported  by  the  branches. 
The  Conference  also  issued  a  strong  protest  against  all 
forms  of  conscription,  and  expressed  "deep  sorrow  at 
the  terrible  famine  that  had  fallen  upon  the  toiling 
people  of  India,"  which,  it  declared,  was  to  a  great 
extent  the  result  of  the  heavy  taxation  placed  upon  the 
people  and  the  expropriation  of  their  slender  resources 
by  the  existing  Government  and  capitalistic  occupation 
of  India. 

To  focus  public  attention  upon  this  latter  question 
was  indeed  impossible.  The  people  of  this  country 
were  so  preoccupied  by  affairs  in  South  Africa  as  to  be 
incapable  of  realising  the  calamitious  condition  of  India. 
The  I.L.P.  protest  was  like  a  very  still  small  voice,  yet 
some  people  heard  it  in  that  far  away  oppressed  land, 
and  appeals  came  to  Hardie  and  MacDonald  asking 
them  to  come  and  see  for  themselves  how  India  was 
governed — appeals  which,  though  they  could  not  be 
responded  to  then,  did  not  go  unheeded. 

A  general  election  was  now  near  at  hand.  The  finish 
of  the  war,  though  still  distant,  was  thought  to  be  within 
sight.  The  trained  British  forces,  two  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  strong,  were  gradually  overmastering  the 
small  volunteer  armies  of  the  Republics,  and  the 
tactical  question  for  the  Government  was  whether  it 
would  wait  for,  or  anticipate,  the  final  victory  before 
going  to  the  country.  For  the  opponents  of  the  war 
policy  it  did  not  matter  which.  They  had  little  hope  of 
coming  out  on  top  in  existing  circumstances,  whilst  the 

160 


MERTHYRTYDVIL 

Liberal  Party,  as  Laodicean  in  its  attitude  on  the  terms 
of  settlement  as  it  had  been  towards  the  war  itself,  had 
no  lead  to  give  the  people.  Whether  the  election  came 
soon  or  late  the  return  of  the  Salisbury-Chamberlain 
Government  was  a  foregone  conclusion. 

In  an  open  letter  to  John  Morley,  Hardie  made  a 
strong  appeal  to  that  statesman  to  cut  himself  adrift 
from  the  Rosebery-Grey-Asquith  section  of  Liberalism 
and  give  a  lead  to  democracy.  "A  section  of  very 
earnest  Liberals  are  thoroughly  ashamed  of  modern 
Liberalism  and  anxious  to  put  themselves  right  with 
their  own  consciences.  Working-class  movements  are 
coming  together  in  a  manner,  for  a  parallel  to  which 
we  require  to  go  back  to  the  early  days  of  the  Radical 
movement.  Already,  two  hundred  and  twelve  thousand 
have  paid  affiliation  fees  to  the  Labour  Representa- 
tion Committee.  What  is  wanted  to  fuse  these  elements 
is  a  man  with  the  brain  to  dare,  the  hand  to  do,  and  the 
heart  to  inspire.  Will  you  be  that  man?"  Mr.  Morley 
did  not  respond.  Probably  Hardie  did  not  expect  him 
to  do  so.  But  the  nature  of  the  appeal  indicates  the 
existence  of  possibilities  which  might  have  considerably 
changed  the  course  of  parliamentary  history  in  this 
country,  and  of  Britain's  international  policy. 

Hardie  was  specially  desirous  that  in  the  forthcoming 
election  all  the  anti-Imperialist  forces  should  work  in 
unison  with  each  other,  and,  in  the  "Labour  Leader," 
he  invited  opinions  as  to  whether  or  not  the  I.L.P. 
should  issue  a  white  list  of  candidates  other  than  Labour 
Party  nominees,  who,  because  of  their  consistent  opposi- 
tion to  the  war  policy,  should  receive  the  support  of 
I.L.P.  electors.  He  declared  himself  strongly  in  favour 
of  such  a  course,  and  specially  mentioned  such  "unbend- 
ing individualists  as  John  Morley  and  Leonard  Court- 
ney," together  with  some  Socialists  like  Dr.  Clark  and 

161 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Lloyd  George.  The  latter  name  classified  as  Socialist, 
sounds  strange  to-day,  but  was  certainly  justified  by 
some  of  the  Welsh  politician's  utterances,  publicly  and 
privately,  on  social  questions  at  that  time. 

The  election  came  before  the  Party  had  made  any 
decision  regarding  the  suggestion,  but  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  it  was  acted  upon,  and  that  the  anti-war 
candidates  got  the  Labour  vote. 

The  Special  Election  Conference  held  at  Bradford 
on  September  29th,  decided  :  "That  the  full  political 
support  of  the  Party  be  given  to  the  candidates  of  the 
S.D.F.  now  in  the  field,  also  to  the  Labour  and  Socialist 
candidates  promoted  by  local  branches  of  the  I.L.P.  in 
conjunction  with  other  bodies,  and  to  all  candidates 
approved  by  the  Labour  Representation  Committee; 
and  that  in  all  other  constituencies,  each  branch  be  left 
to  decide  for  itself  what  action  to  take,  if  any,  so  as 
best  to  promote  the  interests  of  Labour  and  Socialism." 

Hardie  was  not  present  at  this  Conference,  having 
already  entered  upon  a  fight  in  two  separate  consti- 
tuencies, Preston  and  Merthyr.  John  Penny,  the 
General  Secretary,  was  also  absent,  acting  as  election 
agent  at  Preston.  So  rapidly  did  events  move  that  the 
same  issue  of  the  "Labour  Leader"  which  reported  the 
Conference  gave  the  result  of  the  Preston  election, 
Hardie  being  at  the  bottom  of  the  poll  with  4,834  votes 
as  against  nearly  9,000  given  for  each  of  the  two  Tory 
candidates. 

It  was  a  tremendous  task  Hardie  had  undertaken  in 
contesting  simultaneously  these  two  seats,  so  far  apart 
from  each  other,  not  only  geographically,  but  indus- 
trially and  politically.  Yet  the  double  contest  somehow 
typified  Hardie's  personal  attitude  towards  both  politi- 
cal parties.  Preston  was  a  double  constituency  repre- 
sented by  two  Tories.  Merthyr  was  a  similar  constituency 

162 


MERTHYRTYDVIL 

represented  by  two  Liberals.  It  was  as  if  they  had  been 
specially  selected  to  exemplify  his  hostility  to  both 
parties,  yet,  when  the  dissolution  of  Parliament  came,  he 
had  been  selected  for  neither,  and  his  course  of  action 
was  undecided. 

For  months  previously  his  colleagues  on  the  N.A.C., 
desirous  that,  whatever  happened  to  the  other  candi- 
dates, he  should  get  back  to  Parliament,  were  on  the 
look-out  for  a  seat  which  would  give  him  a  reasonable 
chance  of  success — a  seemingly  hopeless  quest  in  the 
feverishly  patriotic  state  of  the  public  mind.  Merthyr, 
in  view  of  his  work  amongst  the  miners,  seemed  the 
most  promising.  As  early  as  March  2ist,  we  find  John 
Penny  writing  to  Francis,  who  has  been  mentioned 
already,  and  who  was  now  secretary  of  the  Penydarren 
I. L. P.,  asking  for  an  accurate  and  exhaustive  report 
upon  the  advisability  of  running  an  I.L.P.  candidate  for 
Merthyr.  The  answer  seems  to  have  been  indecisive 
yet  encouraging,  and,  on  July  25th,  Bruce  Glasier  wrote 
the  following  letter,  which  is  illustrative  alike  of  the 
N.A.C.'s  anxieties  in  the  matter  and  of  Hardie's  personal 
disinterestedness  where  the  welfare  of  the  movement 
was  concerned  : — 

"Chapel-en-le-Frith, 

"via  Stockport. 

"Dear  Francis, — Kind  remembrance  and  hearty 
greetings  to  you.  The  N.A.C.  meets  on  Monday  at 
Derby,  when  we  shall  have  to  take  the  Parliamentary 
situation  into  most  careful  consideration.  Among  the 
most  important  things  that  we  shall  have  to  come  to 
some  conclusions  upon,  is  the  constituency  which  Keir 
Hardie  ought  to  be  advised  to  contest.  We  all  feel 
that  Hardie  has  a  claim  to  the  best  constituency  that 
we  can  offer  him,  and  we  also  feel  that  it  is  of  the  utmost 

163 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

importance  to  the  Party  that  he  should  be  returned. 
Hardie  himself  does  not  view  his  being  returned  to 
Parliament  as  a  matter  of  much  moment,  and  he  is  only 
anxious  that  at  least  he  should  fight  where  a  worthy  vote 
could  be  obtained.  But  I  am  sure  you  will  agree  with 
us  that  if  any  single  man  is  to  be  returned,  that  man 
should  be  Hardie.  I  am  therefore  going  to  ask  you  to 
kindly  inform  me  as  frankly  as  possible  what  you  think 
would  be  Hardie's  chances  were  he  to  contest  Merthyr, 
and  especially  what  you  think  would  be  the  attitude  of 
the  Trade  Unionists  and  miners'  leaders.  Hardie  has 
himself  a  warm  heart  towards  a  South  Wales  seat — or 
rather,  if  you  will,  contest — but  I  am  anxious  that  there 
should  be  at  least  a  reasonable  hope  of  a  very  large 
vote,  if  not  actual  success,  before  we  consent  to  his 
standing.  I  am  -sure,  therefore,  you  will  give  me  your 
sincere  opinion  upon  the  matter.  You  might  let  me 
have  a  reply  c/o  Tom  Taylor,  104  Slack  Lane,  Derby, 
not  later  than  Monday  morning." 

Francis,  upon  whose  judgment  much  reliance  was 
placed,  must  have  replied  favourably,  so  far  as  the 
I.L.P.  was  concerned,  but  doubtfully  with  regard  to 
the  official  Trade  Union  attitude,  and  raising  questions 
as  to  financing  the  candidate,  for  the  following  week, 
on  August  2nd,  Glasier  again  wrote,  explaining  that  "a 
strong  election  fund  committee  had  been  nominated, 
but  that  in  most  cases  the  local  branches  held  themselves 
responsible  for  the  expenses."  In  the  case  of  Merthyr, 
if  Hardie  were  adopted  by  the  Trades  Council,  and 
the  N.A.C.  finally  approved  the  candidature,  the  N.A.C. 
would,  he  was  sure,  contribute  towards  his  expenses.  If 
the  Trades  Council  declined  to  be  responsible  for  his 
candidature,  and  the  I.L.P.  agreed  to  run  him  with  the 
approval  of  the  Trades  Council,  the  N.A.C.  might  con- 

164 


MERTHYR  TYDVIL 

stitutionally  take  the  entire  responsibility  (with,  of 
course,  the  utmost  local  help)  of  running  him.  "Hardie, 
if  returned,  would  support  himself  by  his  pen  and  by 
lecturing,  as  he  did  when  formerly  in  the  House.  There 
would  be  no  difficulties  on  that  score."  The  following 
passage  is  noteworthy  for  various  reasons  :  "The  elec- 
tion fund  will  be  an  entirely  above-board  affair.  The 
money  will  be  collected  publicly,  and  we  expect  that 
many  well-known  advanced  Radicals  will  subscribe. 
A.  E.  Fletcher,  Ed.  Cadbury,  A.  M.  Thomson 
("Dangle"),  Arthur  Priestman,  etc.,  will  probably  be 
on  the  committee." 

Still  the  negotiations  proceeded  leisurely  and  inde- 
cisively, due  doubtless  to  the  difficulty  of  bringing  the 
official  Trade  Unionists  into  line,  and  probably  also 
to  the  belief  that  the  election  could  not  come  till  the 
spring  of  next  year.  As  late  as  September  igth,  we  find 
C.  B.  Stanton,  miners'  agent — whose  strong  support 
of  Hardie  at  this  time  stands  out  in  strange  contrast 
to  his  violent  jingoism  fourteen  years  later — urging 
Francis,  Lawrence,  Davies  and  others,  to  attend  a 
conference  at  Abernant  on  the  following  Saturday,  to 
deal  with  the  question  of  a  Labour  candidature;  and  on 
September  2ist,  John  Penny  wrote  from  Cardiff  to 
Francis  as  follows  :  "This  morning's  London  'Standard' 
reports  that  at  the  conclusion  of  the  meeting  at  Preston, 
Hardie  promised  to  give  his  final  decision  on  Monday 
next.  Let  me  know  if  you  expect  him  in  Merthyr,  and 
if  he  comes  through  Cardiff,  you  might  let  me  know  the 
time  of  his  arrival  so  that  I  could  meet  him  at  the 
station  and  have  a  talk.  I  see  that  he  is  booked  up  to 
be  at  the  Paris  Conference  next  week.  So,  if  he  goes, 
there  will  not  be  much  time  for  fighting.  It  is  now 
honestly,  Preston  or  Merthyr.  My  advice  is  go  in  and 
win.  Saturday's  conference  must  invite  Hardie  and  so 

M  165 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

leave  the  onus  of  decision  with  him."  And,  finally,  on 
the  same  date,  Hardie  himself  wrote  this  note,  also  to 
Francis  : — 

"Dear  Comrade, — Many  thanks  for  your  letter.  / 
have  decided  to  accept  Preston.  It  is  not  likely  now 
that  Merthyr  will  succeed  in  putting  forward  a  Labour 
candidate.  Your  wisest  policy  would  be  to  defeat 
Pritchard  Morgan,  and  thus  leave  the  way  open  for  a 
good  Labour  man  at  the  next  election.  He  is  one  of 
the  most  dangerous  types  the  House  of  Commons 
contains. — Yours  faithfully, 

"J.  KEIR  HARDIE." 

Merthyr  seemed  now  completely  out  of  the  running, 
but  the  following  day,  September  22nd,  the  Abernant 
Conference  adopted  him  and  decided  to  go  on,  no 
matter  what  happened  at  Preston.  Hardie,  of  course, 
did  net  go  to  the  Paris  International  Congress.  He 
addressed  huge  meetings  at  Preston,  and  immediately 
after  the  vote  counting  (the  result  of  which  has  already 
been  given)  passed  into  Wales  just  one  day  before  the 
polling,  to  emerge  triumphantly  as  the  junior  Member 
for  Merthyr,  to  the  great  bewilderment  of  the  newspaper- 
reading  British  public,  who  had  already  seen  his  name 
in  the  lists  of  the  vanquished. 

The  victory  was  practically  won  before  he  arrived  on 
the  scene,  so  enthusiastically  did  the  local  men  throw 
themselves  into  the  contest.  The  N.A.C.  despatched 
Joseph  Burgess  to  act  asi  election  agent,  with  S.  D. 
Shallard  as  his  assistant.  Both  of  these  worked  with  a 
will  in  systematizing  and  co-ordinating  the  committees 
in  the  various  districts  and  in  addressing  public  meet- 
ings, but  it  was  the  people  on  the  spot  who  had  been 
looking  forward  to  and  preparing  for  this  day  during 
many  months,  and  who  by  the  most  Herculean  efforts 

1 66 


MERTHYRTYDVIL 

brought  every  available  Labour  voter  to  the  polling 
booths.  It  was  they  who  won  the  victory.  Their  ener- 
gies were  directed  wholly  against  Pritchard  Morgan, 
characterised  by  Hardie  as  a  "dangerous  type."  They 
did  not  expect,  and,  indeed,  did  not  desire,  to  defeat 
D.  A.  Thomas,  the  senior  member  (known  in  later  years 
as  Lord  Rhondda),  who  was  one  of  the  few  Liberals 
definitely  opposed  to  the  war,  and  had  thereby  preserved 
the  pacifist  tradition  of  the  constituency  whose  greatest 
glory  was  that  it  had  sent  to  Parliament  Henry  Richard 
of  fragrant  memory,  known  as  the  Apostle  of  Peace 
and  pioneer  of  arbitration  in  international  disputes.  Of 
Pritchard  Morgan  nothing  need  be  said  here,  except 
that  he  was  by  profession  a  company  promoter,  and 
doubtless  regarded  a  seat  in  Parliament  as  a  valuable 
aid  to  his  speculative  activities. 

Hardie  only  spoke  three  times  in  the  constituency; 
once  in  the  open-air  at  Mountain  Ash,  once  at  Aberdare, 
and  once  in  Merthyr  (indoors),  and  all  on  the  same  day. 
If  there  were  any  doubts  as  to  the  result,  his  appearance 
in  the  constituency  at  once  dispelled  them.  Yet,  coming 
on  the  back  of  his  Preston  exertions,  the  one  day's 
labour  amongst  the  Welsh  hills  in  an  atmosphere  of 
intense  excitement  must  have  strained  his  powers  of 
endurance  to  the  utmost.  Writing  reminiscently  when 
it  was  all  over,  he  says  :  "I  have  dim  notions  of  weary 
hours  in  a  train,  great  enthusiastic  open-air  crowds  in 
the  streets  of  Preston,  and  thereafter,  oblivion.  Jack 
Penny  tells  me  that  my  opening  performance  in  one  after- 
noon included  almost  continuous  speaking  from  three 
o'clock  till  eight,  with  a  break  of  an  hour  for  tea."  Yet 
he  was  defeated  at  Preston  and  victorious  at  Merthyr, 
though  he  only  spent  eleven  waking  hours  in  the  latter 
constituency  previous  to  the  opening  of  the  poll — eleven 
hours  of  <c glorious  life,"  with  victory  cheering  him  on. 

167 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

And  then  that  last  tense  experience  as  the  votes  were 
being  counted.  'The  Drill  Hall;  the  general  presiding 
officer;  the  anxious  faces  of  the  watchers  at  the  tables 
as  the  voting  urns  were  emptied  and  their  contents 
assorted.  Joe  Burgess,  confident  from  the  start;  St. 
Francis,  strained  to  a  tension  which  threatened  rupture; 
Di  Davies,  drawn  'twixt  hope  and  fear;  the  brothers 
Parker,  moved  to  the  cavernous  depths  of  their  being. 
Di  Davies  looked  up  and  nodded,  whilst  the  shadow  of 
a  smile  twinkled  in  his  eyes.  At  length  came  the  figures, 
and  Di  found  vent  for  his  feelings.  St.  Francis  was  not 
so  fortunate.  Who  can  measure  the  intensity  of  feeling 
bottled  up  in  the  unpolluted  Celt?  A  great  cheering 
crowd.  A  march  to  a  weird  song  whilst  perched  on 
the  shoulders  of  some  stalwart  colliers,  I  trying  vainly 
not  to  look  undignified.  A  chair  helped  considerably. 
That  night,  from  the  hotel  window,  in  response  to 
cries  loud  and  long-continued,  I  witnessed  a  sight 
I  had  never  hoped  to  see  this  side  of  the  pearly 
gate.  My  wife  was  making  a  speech  to  the  delighted 
crowd." 

The  desire  to  be  near  her  husband  at  this  time  of  crisis; 
perhaps  even  an  intuition  of  victory,  had  drawn  the  hame- 
loving  Scots  guidwife  all  the  way  from  quiet  Cumnock 
to  this  scene  of  excitement,  and  probably  here,  for  the 
first  time,  came  to  her  some  real  revelation  of  the  insistent 
call  which  kept  her  man  so  much  away  from  his  ain 
fireside.  It  was  certainly  a  great  gratification  to  Hardie 
to  have  his  wife  sharing  in  his  triumph;  a  pleasure 
equalled  only  by  his  sense  of  the  thrill  of  pride  with 
which  the  great  news  would  be  welcomed  by  his  old 
mother  in  Lanarkshire,  from  whom  he  had  inherited  the 
combative  spirit  that  had  kept  him  fighting  from  boy- 
hood right  up.  To  her  was  sent  the  first  telegram 
announcing  the  result. 

1 68 


MERTHYRTYDVIL 

The  election  figures  were  : — 

D.A.Thomas 8,508 

J.  KeirHardie 5,745 

W.  Pritchard  Morgan  ...  4,004 

Majority  for  Hardie  ...  1,741 
He  took  no  rest,  but  passed  immediately  into  the 
Gower  constituency  to  assist  in  the  candidature  of  John 
Hodge,  of  the  Steel  Smelters,  and  it  was  not  until  the 
General  Election  was  completed  that  he  got  home  into 
Ayrshire  to  meet  the  eager,  almost  boisterous,  greetings 
of  his  old  associates. 

Very  happy  weeks  these  undoubtedly  were  for  Hardie. 
A  natural  man  always,  he  made  no  secret  of  the  pleasure 
he  derived  from  the  congratulations  that  were  showered 
upon  him  at  this  time;  but  most  of  all  he  took  satisfaction 
from  the  expressions  of  delight  on  the  part  of  those  who 
had  been  associated  with  him  in  his  early  struggles  on 
behalf  of  a  political  Labour  movement.  At  Cumnock, 
where  he  was  feted  in  the  Town  Hall,  he  found  himself 
surrounded  by  the  men  who  had  shared  with  him  the 
rough  spade-work  of  twenty  years  before.  James  Neil, 
who  had  led  many  a  picketing  expedition,  was  in  the 
chair.  George  Dryburgh  was  also  there,  and  William 
Scanlon  of  Dreghorn,  and  many  other  veterans  of  the 
Ayrshire  miners'  movement.  A  speech  by  Alex.  Barrow- 
man  so  comprises  almost  in  a  single  paragraph  the  whole 
philosophy  of  Hardie's  career  up  to  that  time,  that  a 
reproduction  of  it  is  more  valuable  than  whole  chapters 
of  minute  biographical  detail  would  be. 
['  "Their  townsman/'  he  said,  "had  he  cared  to  turn  his 
talents  to  personal  advantage,  might  to-day  have  been 
a  wealthy  man.  Liberalism  or  Conservatism  would 
have  paid  a  big  price  for  his  services  had  they  been  for 
sale,  whilst  he  might  have  found  an  easy  life  as  a  writer 

169 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

for  the  ordinary  press.  But  he  was  not  built  that  way. 
He  had  all  his  life  been  creating  agencies  through  which 
the  spirit  of  democracy  might  find  expression,  and  had 
been  content  to  sow  that  others  might  reap.  Twenty 
years  ago  he  might  have  found  a  snug  berth  as  secretary 
to  some  old-established  Union,  instead  of  which,  he 
came  to  Ayrshire  where  the  men  were  not  organised,  and 
established  a  union  that  had  now  nine  thousand  mem- 
bers. Not  finding  any  newspaper  representative  of  his 
opinions,  he  had  started  one,  and  the  'Labour  Leader' 
was  now  a  recognised  power.  Seeing  through  what  he 
conceived  to  be  the  hollowness  of  political  parties,  he 
set  to  found  a  Party  of  his  own,  and  had  succeeded, 
for  the  Labour  Party  was  now  a  reality.  Shallow  people 
might  say  it  was  Mr.  Hardie's  perversity  and  masterful- 
ness that  made  him  do  these  things.  In  reality,  they 
were  the  outcome  of  his  intense  earnestness,  combined 
with  his  extraordinary  energy  and  ability."  J 

In  truth,  an  admirable  summing  of  Mardie's  work 
and  its  impelling  motives,  and,  accustomed  as  he  was 
to  misrepresentation,  it  was  a  joy  to  know  that  he  was 
understood  and  appreciated  by  those  who  knew  him  best. 

A  poem  addressed  to  him  by  an  anonymous  local 
poet,  exemplifies,  whatever  may  be  its  poetic  merit,  how 
far  from  being  merely  materialist  was  the  appeal  which 
his  life  had  made  to  his  comrades  in  Ayrshire. 

"  Brave  Sbul  I  From  early  morn  till  darksome  night, 
For  ever  leading-  in  the  fitfuil  fig-ht. 
Come  for  an  hour  into  our  social  room 
And,  heark'ning-  to  our  cheers,  let  fall  the  gloom 
From  off  thy  wearied  face.     Lay  off  your  sword, 
And  laugfh  and  sing-  with  us  around  the  board. 
And  when  the  nig-ht  is  doae,  youir  armour  don, 
And  face  again  your  fiercei  foes  all  alone — 
Strong-  in  the  faith  that  Rig-ht  at  last  will  be 
The  miig-htiest  factor  in  Society." 

170 


MERTHYR  TYDVIL 

The  Glasgow  movement  also  organised  a  big  con- 
gratulatory demonstration  in  the  City  Hall,  where  only 
ei'ght  months  before  he  had  been  in  some  danger  of 
physical  assault. 

The  chairman  of  the  Glasgow  District  Council  of  the 
I.L.P.,  W.  Martin  Haddow,  presided,  and  on  the  plat- 
form, in  the  balconies,  and  in  the  area  of  the  hall, 
Socialists,  Trade  Unionists,  Co-operators,  Irish 
Nationalists,  besides  men  and  women  of  every  shade 
and  section  of  advanced  political  thought,  joined,  as 
one  press  writer  said,  "to  do  honour  to  the  man  in  whose 
triumph  they  seemed  to  see  the  foreshadowing  of  ulti- 
mate political  victory  for  that  democratic  principle  which 
concentrated  the  aims  of  them  all."  The  Merthyr 
victory  was  indeed  one  of  the  great  events  of  his  life, 
bringing  to  him  a  sense  of  real  personal  achievement, 
and  it  was  recognised  as  such  by  the  people  for  whose 
appreciation  he  most  cared.  He  enjoyed  it  thoroughly 
and  made  no  attempt  to  disguise  his  pleasure.  The 
following  Sunday  he  spoke  at  a  meeting  similar  to  that 
at  Glasgow  in  the  Free  Trade  Hall,  Manchester. 
During  the  next  week  he  was  banqueted  by  the  London 
City  Socialist  Circle,  and  made  a  run  into  Wales  for 
what  proved  to  be  a  triumphal  tour  through  his  constitu- 
ency, and  then  back  into  Ayrshire  for  a  few  weeks3 
much-needed  rest  and  quietude  in  the  companionship  of 
his  own  household. 

The  children  were  now  grown  up  and  of  an  age  to 
understand  and  take  some  pride  in  the  work  in  which 
their  father  was  engaged.  The  eldest  boy,  James,  had 
just  finished  his  apprenticeship  as  an  engineer,  the 
youngest,  Duncan,  was  making  a  start  at  the  same  trade, 
and  the  daughter,  Agnes — known  familiarly  as  Nan- 
had  also  left  school,  and  was  assisting  her  mother  in 
the  housekeeping  duties.  Doubtless  as  they  gathered 

171 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

round  the  fireside  they  found  much  to  interest  them  in 
the  tales  their  father  had  to  tell  of  the  big  world  in 
which  he  had  travelled  so  much;  of  what  he  had  seen 
in  the  American  Wild  West;  of  his  visits  to  France, 
and  of  the  varied  contrasting  scenes  of  life  in  London 
Town,  and  of  the  House  of  Commons  and  the  strange 
animals  that  frequented  that  place,  to  which  he  was  now 
going  back  again.  He  was  a  good  story-teller,  given 
the  right  kind  of  audience,  and  what  better  company 
could  there  be  than  his  own  young  folk  amongst  whom 
to  fight  his  battles  and  live  his  life  over  again  during 
these  few  weeks  of  restfulness?  And  for  them,  too, 
there  was  some  compensation  for  having  such  an  absentee 
father.  December  3rd  saw  him  back  at  Westminster 
taking  his  stand  once  again  as  a  "one-man  Party." 


172 


CHAPTER   EIGHT 

PARLIAMENT      ONCE      MORE "THE      WHITE      HERALD" — 

SERIOUS    ILLNESS 

WHEN  the  new  Parliament  met,  Hardie  was  the 
only  one  of  the  six  hundred  and  seventy 
Members  who  put  in  an  appearance  without 
being  summoned  to  attend.  All  the  others  had,  accord- 
ing to  usage,  been  summoned  by  their  respective  party 
leaders,  Conservative,  Liberal  and  Nationalist.  The 
Liberals  even  claimed  Richard  Bell,  the  other  L.R.C. 
representative.  Hardie  had  no  leader,  and  only 
nominally  had  he  a  colleague.  Yet  he  was  not  unwilling 
to  have  one,  as  the  following  utterance  shows  :  "I  am 
told  there  is  a  publication  called  the  'Gazette'  in  which 
notices  concerning  Parliament  appear,  but  never  having 
seen  the  publication  I  cannot  vouch  for  the  truth  of  the 
statement.  Leaders  of  parties,  it  seems,  send  out 
notices  to  their  followers  concerning  when  Parliament 
is  to  meet,  and  the  fact  that  John  Burns  has  not  yet 
taken  to  fulfilling  this  part  of  his  duties  accounts  for  my 
having  been  unsummoned.  It  may  be  further  noticed 
that  as  the  Labour  Party  has  not  yet  appointed  its  Whip, 
I  am  an  unwhipped  Member  of  Parliament.  Does  the 
House  contain  another?" 

There  is  here  more  than  a  hint  that  he  would  have 
'  been  willing  to  recognise  John  Burns  as  his  leader,  and 
also  a  suggestion  that  the  time  was  opportune  for  the 
Trade    Union    Members   of    Parliament   to   cut   them- 
selves adrift  from  the  Liberal  Party  and  form  a  distinct 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Labour  group.  The  hint  was  not  taken,  and  all 
through  his  second  Parliament,  as  in  his  first,  Hardie 
was  condemned  to  "plough  a  lonely  furrow."  /He  did, 
indeed,  continue  for  some  months  hoping'"  that  the 
working-class  members  would  group  themselves  to- 
gether at  least  for  the  purpose  of  taking  common  action 
on  industrial  questions,  and  it  was  certainly  no  blame  of 
his  that  this  did  not  take  place.  Again  and  again,  at 
this  time,  he  went  out  of  his  way  to  make  public  his 
appreciation  of  Burns's  high  debating  powers,  and  his 
belief  in  the  possibility  of  forming  a  parliamentary 
party  under  his  leadership.  But  the  hour  had  not  come, 
and  even  if  it  had  come,  John  Burns  was  not  the  man. 
Hardie  himself  was  the  man,  but  he  had  to  await 
the  hour — and  the  followers.  In  this  House  of  Com- 
mons he  was  still  an  Ishmael.  It  was  well  for  him  that, 
in  addition  to  his  faith  in  the  movement,  he  possessed 
what  many  persons  did  not  credit  him  with,  a  lively 
sense  of  humour.  The  whimsicality  of  the  whole  situa- 
tion gave  him  food  for  much  quiet  laughter. 

A  general  election  had  just  been  held.  The  whole 
public  life  of  the  nation  had  been  convulsed,  and  the 
result  was  a  House  of  Commons  in  which  the  only  new 
feature  was  Keir  Hardie.  The  Salisbury-Chamberlain 
Government  was  in  power  as  before.  The  Liberal 
Party  was  in  opposition,  and,  as  before,  impotent  and 
practically  leaderless.  The  Nationalists  were,  as  before, 
at  the  tail  of  the  Liberal  Party.  It  seemed  as  if  the 
general  election  had  been  held  for  the  sole  and  express 
purpose  of  getting  Hardie  back  into  Parliament.  That, 
at  least,  was  all  it  had  achieved.  In  his  present  mood, 
Parliament  and  all  its  appurtenances  seemed  to  him 
like  a  grotesque  joke.  Reference  has  already  been 
made  to  his  faculty  for  literary  expression.  If  ever,  as 
a  supplement  to  this  memoir,  there  should  be  pub- 

174 


IN    PARLIAMENT 

lished  a  selection  of  his  fugitive  writings,  there  will 
surely  be  included  his  impression  of  the  opening  of 
this  Parliament.  It  is  replete  with  genial,  yet  caustic 
sarcasm,  of  which  a  mere  extract  cannot  possibly  convey 
the  full  flavour.  After  explaining  the  preliminary  mum- 
meries and  their  Cromwellian  origin,  he  says,  "new 
members  in  the  lobby  are  astonished  at  the  procession 
they  now  behold  approaching.  First  comes  a  police 
official,  a  fine,  burly,  competent-looking  man;  behind 
him  follows  a  most  melancholy-looking  old  gentleman 
who  would  make  the  fortune  of  an  undertaker  by  going 
out  as  a  mute  to  funerals.  He  wears  black  cotton  gloves, 
his  hands  are  crossed  in  front  of  his  paunch,  and  he 
moves  sadly  and  solemnly  behind  the  police  officer.  It 
might  be  a  procession  to  the  scaffold  so  serious  does 
everyone  look.  Behind  the  mute  comes  'Black  Rod/ 
He  is  gorgeously  arrayed,  not  exactly  in  'purple  and 
fine  linen/  but  in  scarlet  and  gold  lace.  He  moves  for 
all  the  world  like  an  automaton  worked  by  some 
machinery  which  is  out  of  gear.  If  ever  you  have  seen 
a  cat,  daintily  picking  its  way  across  a  roadway  on  a 
wet  day,  you  have  some  idea  how  General  Sir  M.  Bid- 
dulph  approaches  the  House  of  Commons."  And  so 
on,  through  all  the  proceedings  down  to  the  final  exit 
of  the  Lord  Chancellor  from  the  House  of  Lords,  "a 
squat  little  man,  with  a  pug  nose,  trying  to  look  digni- 
fied/' Finally,  we  have  Hardie's  serious  comment  on 
the  whole  ridiculous  tomfoolery,  which,  as  he  sees  it, 
is  "quaint  without  being  impressive/'  "Times  and  cir- 
cumstances have  changed  during  the  last  thousand 
years,  but  the  forms  of  these  institutions  remain 
practically  as  they  then  were,  which  is  typical  of  much 
that  goes  on  inside  these  walls.33 

A  week  or  two  later  he  was  writing  in  a  very  different 
mood,    describing   the   naval    and   military   pageantry, 

175 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

attendant  upon  the  funeral  of  Queen  Victoria.  The 
Queen  died  on  January  2ist,  and  it  is  significant  that  in 
the  "Labour  Leader"  the  following  week,  his  reference 
was  not  to  that  event,  but  to  the  death  of  another — a  com- 
paratively obscure  woman — Mrs.  Edwards,  of  Liver- 
pool, the  wife  of  John  Edwards,  the  founder  of  the 
"Reformers'  Year  Book."  She  had  been  one  of  the 
many  intimate  friends  he  had  made  during  his  travelling 
to  and  fro  among  the  comrades.  Of  her  he  wrote  : 
"She  was  the  most  kindly  and  unselfish  creature  that  ever 
trod  the  earth.  Her  tact  and  her  cleverness,  her  ener- 
getic spirit,  and,  above  all  else,  the  great  soul,  big 
enough,  noble  enough  to  forgive  and  sweep  aside  the 
faults  of  everybody  and  search  out  the  kernel  of  good- 
ness that  is  so  often  hidden  by  the  hard  covering  of 
one's  defects."  Yet  the  omission  of  any  reference  to 
Queen  Victoria's  death  was  probably  not  deliberate. 
He  was  at  the  time  in  the  North  of  Scotland,  addressing 
anti-war  meetings  in  Dundee,  Aberdeen  and  Inverness, 
and  in  the  midst  of  this  work  the  news  of  the  passing  of 
his  friend  would  affect  him  more  nearly  than  the  passing 
of  the  monarch. 

Next  week,  he  paid  his  tribute  to  the  departed  Queen. 
"It  is  as  the  pattern  wife  and  mother,  the  embodiment 
of  the  virtues  upon  which  the  middle-class  matron  bases 
her  claim  to  be  considered  the  prop  and  mainstay  of  the 
race,  that  Queen  Victoria  was  known  and  respected. 
The  pomps  and  ceremonies  of  her  station  do  not  seem 
to  have  had  any  charm  for  her,  whilst  her  manner  of 
dressing  was  plain,  almost  to  dowdiness.  The  quiet 
retreat  of  Balmoral,  far  removed  from  the  turmoil  and 
intrigue  of  fashionable  society,  had  for  her  a  charm 
which  few  can  appreciate.  The  pomp  and  panoply  of 
martial  life  was  as  far  removed  from  such  a  life  as  any- 
thing well  could  be. 


IN    PARLIAMENT 

"There  are  tens  of  thousands  of  loyal  British  subjects 
who  loved  to  honour  the  Queen,  who  in  their  hearts 
resent  the  association  of  her  memory  with  the  military 
life  of  the  nation,  and  in  their  name,  as  well  as  in  my 
own,  I  enter  my  protest  against  the  barbarous  display  of 
the  bloodthirsty  implements  of  war,  amidst  which  the 
remains  of  a  peace-loving  woman  will  to-day  be  laid 
to  rest." 

The  "barbarous  display"  took  place  in  due  course, 
and  Hardie,  in  a  very  powerful  description  of  it,  which 
cannot  be  reproduced  here,  laid  bare  what  seemed  to 
him  to  be  the  sinister  meaning  and  purport  of  it  all ; 
the  militarisation  of  the  very  spirit  of  the  nation,  and 
the  subordination  of  the  true  idea  of  citizenship.  "In  a 
constitutionally  governed  country,  Parliament,  not  the 
monarch,  is  the  real  seat  of  authority.  The  soldier  is 
the  servant  of  the  State.  On  this  occasion  the  soldier 
was  everything,  the  civilian  nothing.  The  Members  of 
Parliament,  the  chosen  of  the  people,  the  real  rulers  of 
the  nation — they  came  not  to  take  part  in  the  funeral, 
but  stood  upon  the  purple  cloth-covered  seats,  and 
gazed  like  so  many  school-children  upon  the  military 
thirty  yards  away.  The  administrative  councils  of  the 
nation  were  totally  ignored.  The  cadets  of  the  Duke  of 
York's  Military  Training  College  had  a  stand;  the  ser- 
vants at  Buckingham  Palace  had  one;  but  there  was 
no  room  in  all  the  streets  of  London,  nor  in  the  public 
parks  through  which  the  procession  passed,  for  a  stand 
for  the  members  of  the  London  County  Council. 

"As  for  the  seats  of  learning,  the  Christian  Church, 
Science,  Art  and  Commerce — they  were  all  ignored. 
Having  joyfully  placed  their  necks  under  the  heel  of 
the  soldier,  they  are  each  receiving  their  meet  reward." 
Thus,  bitterly  and  prophetically  did  Hardie  read 
the  lesson  of  Queen  Victoria's  military  funeral,  the  pre- 
177 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

cursor  of  many  a  similar  pageant,  deliberately  planned, 
as  he  believed,  to  overrule  the  naturally  peaceful  ten- 
dencies of  the  common  people.  Hardie  was  a  Republican, 
but  never  obtrusively  so,  and  on  this  occasion  it  was 
not  so  much  the  monarchy  that  was  the  object  of  his 
attack,  as  the  aggressive  militarism  which  sought  to 
pervert  the  national  respect  for  the  departed  monarch 
to  its  own  sinister  ends. 

A  few  months  later  his  views  on  the  monarchical  insti- 
tution itself  found  an  opportunity  for  expression  when 
the  revised  Civil  List,  consequent  upon  the  succession 
of  King  Edward  to  the  throne,  came  up  for  discussion 
in  Parliament.  He  had  previously,  on  the  King's 
Speech,  endeavoured  to  add  an  amendment,  which  after 
thanking  the  King  for  his  speech,  expressed  regret  that 
the  monarchy  had  not  been  abolished,  which  the  Speaker 
had  gravely,  and  without  any  apparent  perception  of 
the  covert  humour  of  the  proposal,  ruled  out  of  order. 
He  had  also  intervened  in  the  debate  on  the 
expenses  of  the  late  Queen's  funeral  in  a  manner  not 
pleasing  to  some  of  the  Tory  members  whose  unman- 
nerly interruptions  drew  from  him  the  remark  that 
"honourable  members  sitting  opposite  are  evidently  not 
in  a  condition  to  behave  themselves,"  a  reference  to 
the  after-dinner  boisterousness  of  the  said  honourable 
Members  which  the  Speaker  declared  to  be  "offensive." 

On  the  question  of  the  Civil  List  he  was  not  to  be 
turned  aside.  Under  the  new  proposals  the  provision 
for  the  Royal  Family  was  increased  from  £553,000  to 
£620,000,  but  although,  as  a  matter  of  course,  Hardie 
objected  to  this  increase  and  challenged  every  detail,  it 
was  on  the  ground  of  his  li objections  to  monarchical 
principles"  that  he  opposed  the  entire  Civil  List  and 
divided  the  House,  taking  fifty-eight  members  into  the 
Lobby  along  with  him,  John  Burns  acting  as  his  fellow- 


IN    PARLIAMENT 

teller  in  the  division.  Of  the  fifty-eight,  only  four  were 
working-class  Members.  The  other  fifty-four  were  of 
the  Irish  Party.  The  "Leeds  Mercury's"  description  of 
Hardie's  deportment  on  this  occasion  may  be  quoted  as 
an  aid  to  our  general  conception  of  the  kind  of  man 
he  was,  and  also  as  a  corrective  to  the  widespread 
misrepresentation  of  him  as  a  mere  self-advertising 
demagogue.  "Mr.  Keir  Hardie,"  said  the  "Mercury," 
"delivered  a  speech  on  frankly  Republican  lines.  He 
drew  cheers  from  the  Tories  by  admitting  that  the  work- 
ing class  were  now  favourable  to  Royalty,  and  provoked 
their  laughter  by  adding  that  this  was  because  the 
working  man  did  not  know  what  Royalty  meant.  But 
he  quietly  stuck  to  his  point.  The  hereditary  principle 
whether  in  the  Legislature  or  on  the  Throne,  was,  he 
maintained,  degrading  to  the  manhood  of  the  nation, 
and  it  was  the  clear  duty  of  men  like  himself  to  try  to 
get  the  nation  to  recognise  the  fact.  This,  and  many 
other  things,  he  uttered  in  smooth,  dispassionate,  fault- 
lessly fashioned  phraseology.  He  is,  in  fact,  one  of  the 
most  cultured  speakers  the  present  House  of  Commons 
can  boast.  His  doctrines  are  anathematised  by  some, 
contemptuously  laughed  at  by  others,  but  he  has  a 
Parliamentary  style  and  diction  that  may  put  the  bulk 
of  our  legislators  to  shame." 

These  events  and  discussions  extended  over  several 
months,  with  much  else  in  between,  but  are  here  grouped 
consecutively,  as  the  most  effective  means  of  setting 
forth  Hardie's  views  and  attitude  towards  Royalty.  He 
never  at  any  time  went  out  of  his  way  to  attack  the 
Monarchy,  but  simply  availe.d  himself  of  the  opportuni- 
ties to  do  so,  as  they  arose.  .  His  aim,  of  which  he  never 
lost  sight,  was  the  building  up  of  a  Labour  Party  for  the 
realisation  of  Socialism."!  To  this  purpose,  all  other 
questions  were  subsidiary  or  contributory.  He  recog- 

179 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

nised  very  clearly  that  in  his  present  situation,  without 
the  support  of  an  organised  party  in  the  House,  the 
only  use  he  could  make  of  Parliament  was  as  a  propa- 
ganda platform,  and  even  that  was  determined,  to  some 
extent,  by  his  power  of  arresting  the  attention  of  the 
capitalist  press.  And  this  he  certainly  succeeded  in 
doing.  The  British  people  were  never  allowed  to 
forget  that  there  was  a  man  in  Parliament  called  Keir 
Hardie,  or  that  he  belonged  to  the  dangerous  fraternity 
of  Socialists. 

Right  in  the  middle  of  this  discussion  about  Royalty 
he  found  an  opportunity  for  putting  Socialism  in  the 
centre  of  the  stage,  so  to  speak,  though  only  for  a  brief 
moment.  April  23rd,  1901,  is  an  historic  date  for  the 
British  Socialist  movement.  Hardie,  in  the  private 
members'  ballot,  had  been  lucky  enough  to  secure  a 
place  for  that  particular  date,  but  unlucky  enough  to  be 
last  on  the  list.  He  put  down  the  following  resolution, 
which,  as  it  is  the  first  complete  Socialist  declaration 
ever  made  in  the  British  House  of  Commons,  must 
have  a  place  in  this  account  of  the  life  of  its  author : 
"That  considering  the  increasing  burden  which  the 
private  ownership  of  land  and  capital  is  imposing  upon 
the  industrious  and  useful  classes  of  the  community,  the 
poverty  and  destitution  and  general  moral  and  physical 
deterioration  resulting  from  a  competitive  system  of 
wealth  production  which  aims  primarily  at  profit-making, 
the  alarming  growth  of  trusts  and  syndicates,  able  by 
reason  of  their  great  wealth  to  influence  governments  and 
plunge  peaceful  nations  into  war  to  serve  their  own 
interests,  this  House  is  of  opinion  that  such  a  state  of 
matters  is  a  menace  to  the  well-being  of  the  Realm  and 
calls  for  legislation  designed  to  remedy  the  same  by 
inaugurating  a  Socialist  Commonwealth  founded  upon 
the  common  ownership  of  land  and  capital,  production 

1 80 


IN    PARLIAMENT 

for  use  and  not  for  profit,  and  equality  of  opportunity 
for  every  citizen." 

His  presentation  of  this  resolution  was  certainly  a 
most  remarkable  parliamentary  performance.  It  was 
half  -  past  eleven  before  the  preceding  business 
was  disposed  of.  At  twelve  o'clock  the  House 
must  stand  adjourned.  At  twenty-five  minutes  to  twelve 
Hardie  rose  to  put  the  case  for  Socialism  to  an  audience 
mostly  comprised  of  its  enemies.  Arthur  Balfour  was 
there,  drawn,  as  one  writer  said,  "by  the  metaphysical 
curiosity  of  the  Scot,  to  amuse  himself  hearing  what  a 
brother  Scot  had  to  say  on  Socialism."  John  Morley  was 
there,  the  parliamentary  embodiment  of  individualist 
philosophy.  The  young  Tory  bloods  were  there,  their 
hostility,  for  the  moment,  submerged  in  their  curiosity. 
The  Liberal  commercialists  were  there,  interested,  but 
critical  and  incredulous.  The  Irish  members  were  there, 
sympathetic  and  encouraging  in  their  demeanour. 

How  skilfully  Hardie  performed  his  difficult  task,  let 
the  capitalist  press  again  bear  witness.  Said  the  parlia- 
mentary writer  for  the  "Daily  News"  :  "  Mr.  Keir  Hardie 
had  about  twenty  minutes  in  which  to  sketch  the  out- 
lines of  a  co-operative  commonwealth.  He  seemed  to 
me  to  perform  this  record  feat  of  constructive  idealism 
with  remarkable  skill,  and  indeed  it  would  be  difficult 
to  imagine  a  creation  of  human  fancy  that  would  produce 
more  deplorable  results  than  the  society  from  which  Mr. 
Hardie  in  his  vivid  way  deduced  the  China  Expedition, 
the  South  African  War,  and  the  London  slums.  Mr. 
Balfour,  coming  back  from  dinner,  smiled  pleasantly  on 
the  speaker,  doubtless  calculating  that  things  as  they 
were  would  last  his  time." 

The  closing  sentences  of  Hardie's  speech  are  worth 
preserving  because  of  the  prophetic  note  in  them,  which 
indeed  was  seldom  absent  from  any  of  his  utterances. 

N  181 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

"Socialism,  by  placing  the  land  and  the  instruments  of 
production  in  the  hands  of  the  community,  will  eliminate 
only  the  idle  and  useless  classes  at  both  ends  of  the 
scale.  (The  millions  of  toilers  and  of  business  men  do 
not  benefit  from  the  present  system.  We  are  called 
upon  to  decide  the  question  propounded  in  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount,  as  to  whether  we  will  worship  God  or 
Mammon.  The  last  has  not  been  heard  of  this  move- 
ment either  in  the  House  or  in  the  country,  for  as 
surely  as  Radicalism  democratised  the  system  of  govern- 
ment politically  in  the  last  century,  so  will  Socialism 
democratise  the  industrialism  of  the  country  in  the 
coming  century." 

And  as  he  said,  so  it  is  coming  to  pass.  The  new 
century  to  which  he  pointed  is  still  young,  but  the 
democratising  of  industry  proceeds  apace.  Shop 
stewards,  workshop  committees,  Industrial  Councils, 
Socialist  Guilds,  and  in  Russia,  the  Soviet  system  as  a 
method  of  government,  are  all  re-creating  society  on 
Socialist  models.  Many  of  the  elements  making  towards 
the  democratic  control  and  direction  of  industry  are  now 
in  operation,  and  so  Hardie's  prediction  is  in  course 
of  being  fulfilled.  Truly,  it  was  not  without  reason 
that  many  of  his  associates  ascribed  to  him  the  qualities 
of  a  seer. 

Meantime,  outside  Parliament,  the  movement  con- 
tinued to  move.  The  Labour  Representation  Committee 
had  held  its  first  Annual  Conference,  and  was  able  to 
report  an  affiliated  membership  of  470,000  workers.  All 
the  Socialist  bodies,  I.L.P.,  S.D.F.,  and  Fabian  Society, 
were  represented,  and  although  the  Conference  rejected 
a  resolution  moved  by  Bruce  Glasier  on  behalf  of  the 
I.L.P.  declaring  for  an  "Industrial  Commonwealth 
founded  upon  the  common  ownership  of  land  and 
capital,"  it  adopted  one  brought  forward  by  the  Dockers, 

182 


IN   PARLIAMENT 

I 

demanding  "the  passing  of  such  laws  as  will  put  an  end  to 
a  system  under  which  the  producer  of  wealth  has  to  bear 
an  enormous  burden  in  the  shape  of  rents  and  profits, 
which  go  to  the  non-producers." 

The  I.L.P.  also,  at  its  Annual  Conference,  held  this 
year  at  Leicester,  was  able  to  report  considerable  pro- 
gress, but  naturally  found  its  chief  cause  for  self-con- 
gratulation in  the  fact  that  Hardie  was  once  more  in 
Parliament,  his  election  being,  in  the  opinion  of  the 
Executive,  "a  signal  of  battle,  not  only  for  the  I.L.P., 
but  for  the  entire  Labour  and  Socialist  movement  of  the 
nation/'  A  proposal  by  the  N.A.C.  for  the  establish- 
ment of  a  "Payment  of  Members'  Fund,"  having  for  its 
object  to  pay  him  ,£150  a  year  as  "a  compensation  for 
the  extra  expenses  and  loss  of  time  entailed  upon  him 
as  a  working  Member  of  Parliament,"  was  endorsed  by 
acclamation,  and  on  this  modest  allowance,  raised  by 
voluntary  subscription,  Hardie  became,  for  the  first  time, 
a  paid  Member  of  Parliament.  It  is  very  doubtful  if  this 
sum  ever  covered  his  expenses.  It  certainly  made  pro- 
vision for  no  more  than  very  "plain  living"  to  which 
happily  he  was  well  inured. 

In  the  industrial  world,  also,  events  were  shaping 
in  a  way  calculated  to  impress  even  the  most  conserva- 
tive sections  of  the  workers  with  a  sense  of  the  need  for 
parliamentary  action.  The  Taff  Vale  decision,  which 
rendered  trade  unions  legally  responsible  for  the  actions 
of  their  least  responsible  officials,  together  with  other 
decisions  making  peaceful  picketing  a  criminal  offence 
while  leaving  employers  free  to  organise  blackleg 
labour  under  police  protection,  struck  at  the  very  life  of 
the  industrial  labour  movement  and  converted  to  the 
policy  of  the  I.L.P.  thousands  who  could  not  be  reached 
by  street  corner  or  platform  agitation.  Naturally, 
Hardie,  MacDonald,  Snowden,  and  the  other  Labour 

183 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Party  advocates  did  not  fail  to  exploit  the  situation  to 
the  advantage  of  their  cause. 

In  the  midst  of  all  this  work  he  contributed  to  the 
Co-operative  Annual  for  1901  an  article,  informative 
and  suggestive,  on  Municipal  Socialism,  in  which  he 
summarised  comprehensively  the  results  achieved  up 
to  that  time.  The  facts  and  figures  have,  of  course, 
been  superseded  by  new  facts  and  figures,  but  his  argu- 
ment, based  alike  upon  historical  continuity  and  upon 
common  sense,  has  not  been  superseded. 

"The  battle  now  being  waged  around  Municipal  trad- 
ing is  but  the  renewal  of  a  struggle  carried  on  for  two 
hundred  years  against  king,  cleric,  and  lordling  ere  yet 
there  was  a  Parliament  in  being.  The  issues  remain  the 
same,  however  much  the  methods  may  have  changed. 
^As  the  burghers  triumphed  then,  so  will  they  now. 
Already  property  of  the  estimated  value  of  ,£500,000,000 
has  passed  from  private  to  public  ownership.  The 
citizens  of  our  time  are  beginning  to  realise  the  benefits 
which  follow  in  the  train  of  common  ownership.  On 
every  side  can  be  seen  the  dawning  of  the  idea  that  were 
the  means  of  producing  the  fundamental  necessaries  of 
life — food,  clothing,  shelter — owned  communally,  as 
many  of  the  conveniences  already  are,  the  problem  of 
poverty  would  be  solved." 

In  this  way  he  sought  to  make  it  plain  that  Municipal 
Socialism  was  simply  through  Local  Government  admin- 
istration an  application  of  the  co-operative  principle. 

About  this  time,  and  in  all  the  following  years,  he  was 
much  in  request  as  a  lecturer  by  the  Co-operative  Educa- 
tional Committees  which  were  being  formed  throughout 
the  country,  largely  as  the  result  of  permeation  work  by 
Socialist  members  of  the  various  societies.  To  these 
requests  he  responded  as  often  as  his  other  duties  would 
allow.  His  name  invariably  drew  audiences  composed 

184 


IN    PARLIAMENT 

not  of  co-operators  only,  but  of  the  general  public, 
brought  by  curiosity  to  see  and  hear  the  notorious 
agitator  under  non-political  and  therefore  non-committal 
auspices.  On  these  occasions  he  usually  put  party 
politics  aside  and  devoted  himself  to  co-operative 
propaganda. 

Frequently,  in  illustration  of  the  practical  value  of 
co-operative  effort,  he  recalled  how,  in  the  early  days  of 
the  Miners'  Trade  Union  movement  the  establishment 
of  the  Co-operative  shop  in  a  district  had  enabled  the 
miners  to  free  themselves  from  the  grip  of  the  "Com- 
pany's Stores,"  and  had  thereby  given  that  self-reliance 
upon  which  their  fight  for  better  working  conditions 
depended;  a  practical  illustration  which  was  easily 
understood,  and  paved  the  way  for  an  exposition  of  the 
more  far-reaching  possibilities  of  co-operation. 
£  He  believed  that  the  co-operative  movement  must  in 
course  of  time,  and  of  necessity,  join  hands  with  the 
Trade  Union  movement  for  the  attainment  of  political 
power,  but  refrained  from  urging  this  too  strenuously,  *•• 
lest  premature  action  should  be  hurtful  rather  than  bene- 
ficial to  both  movements.  The  co-operative  movement 
has  seldom  had  a  more  judicious  or  a  more  sincere  advo- 
cate than  Keir  Hardie. 

In  July  of  this  year,  while  Parliament  was  still  in 
session,  Hardie  had  his  first  touch  of  illness,  and  had  to 
remain  in  bed  for  upwards  of  a  week,  a  new  experience 
to  which  he  did  not  take  at  all  kindly.  The  surprising 
thing  to  his  friends  was  that  he  had  not  broken  down 
sooner.  He  had,  as  one- of  them  said,  "been  doing  the 
work  of  several  ordinary  mortals."  His  correspondence 
itself  was  enormous,  and  he  had  no  private  secretary. 
His  advice  was  sought  by  all  sections  of  the  Labour 
movement.  Every  day  brought  its  committees,  depu- 
tations, interviews  and  visitors  from  far  and  near;  while 

185 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

every  week-end  found  him  on  the  propaganda  platform 
in  some  part  of  the  country,  sometimes  far  distant  from 
London.  This  entailed  long,  wearying  train  journeys. 
He  recovered  quickly,  but  it  might  have  been  better  if 
he  had  taken  warning  from  this  first  indication  that  his 
powers  of  endurance  were  being  overstrained.  He  was 
immediately  as  busy  as  ever,  both  inside  and  outside 
of  Parliament,  but  especially  outside  amongst  the  I.L.P. 
branches  and  trade  unions,  stimulating  them  to  get  ready 
with  their  candidates  and  organisation  for  the  next 
general  election  which  he  was  convinced  would  see  a 
Labour  Party  very  strongly  entrenched  at  Westminster. 

It  must  be  said,  however,  that  such  opportunities  as 
occurred  for  testing  the  grounds  for  this  optimism  did 
not  give  much  encouragement.  A  three-cornered  by- 
election  contest  in  North-East  Lanark  found  Robert 
Smillie  once  more  at  the  bottom  of  the  poll,  and  at  Wake- 
field,  in  the  spring  of  the  following  year,  Philip  Snowden 
was  defeated  by  the  Conservative  candidate  in  a  straight 
fight.  Yet  these  seeming  rebuffs  notwithstanding,  pre- 
parations for  the  election  went  on  steadily,  and  the 
movement  continued  to  grow  in  strength.  These  by- 
elections  were  regarded  as  merely  experimental  skir- 
mishes, and  not  symptomatic  of  the  probable  results  in 
a  general  election  fight. 

Speaking  at  Clifford's  Inn  under  the  auspices  of  the 
Metropolitan  Council  of  the  I.L.P.,  Hardie  said, 
4 'There  were  subtle  causes  at  work  which  were  hasten- 
ing the  movement,  and  amongst  them  might  be  instanced 
such  decisions  as  that  recently^given  by  the  House  of 
Lords  in  the  Taff  Vale  case.  |  The  power  of  the  trade 
unions  through  the  strike  had  tTeen  immense,  but  their 
power  through  the  ballot-box  was  immensely  greater, 
/  and  it  was  only  necessary  for  their  members  to  learn  to 
vote  as  they  had  learned  to  strike,  to  secure  their  victoryTj 

1 86 


"THE   WHITE    HERALD" 

There  was  reason  for  looking  forward  with  absolute  con- 
fidence to  the  future. " 

In  the  midst  of  all  this  public  activity  Hardie  was  not 
free  from  the  casual  and  inevitable  cares  and  difficulties 
of  family  life  which  in  some  circumstances  may  be  miti- 
gated, but  in  none  can  be  evaded.  In  January,  1902, 
his  daughter  Agnes,  now  verging  into  early  womanhood, 
was  taken  dangerously  ill,  and  for  several  weeks  hovered 
between  life  and  death.  For  the  whole  of  that  period 
the  father  was  absent  from  Parliament  and  from  the 
public  platform.  He  was  in  Cumnock  by  the  bed  of 
sickness,  nursing  the  girl,  comforting  the  mother  and 
hiding  his  own  fears  as  best  he  could.  In  the  first  week 
in  February,  he  was  able,  in  the  "Labour  Leader,"  to 
assure  enquiring  sympathisers  that  the  invalid  was 
making  fair  progress  towards  recovery.  "She  is  still 
weak,  but  with  care  that  will  pass."  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
this  trouble  left  effects  behind  from  which  she  could 
never  entirely  shake  herself  free,  and  caused  him  to  be 
always  more  tenderly  solicitous  for  her  than  for 
the  two  boys  who  had  inherited  his  own  sturdy 
constitution. 

In  the  last  week  of  the  following  April  came  another 
trial,  more  inevitable,  but  none  the  less  wrenching 
because  it  was  inevitable.  "On  the  night  when  Mr. 
Balfour  gagged  discussions  regarding  the  Bread  Tax,  I 
found  Hardie,"  wrote  one  of  his  friends,  "in  the  inner 
lobby  watching  for  a  telegram.  'If  I  get  a  wire/  said 
he,  'I  must  leave  for  Scotland  by  the  midnight  train/ 
and  at  the  time  when  the  House  was  dividing  he  was 
going  northward."  He  had  been  summoned  to  the 
deathbed  of  his  mother  and  father.  .The  two  old  people 
passed  away  within  an  hour  of  each  other,  and  it  could 
be  said  of  them  literally  that  "in  death  they  were  not 
divided."  The  now  famous  son,  of  whom  they  were  so 

187. 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

proud,  was  in  time  to  bid  them  good-bye.  A  strange 
parting  that  must  have  been. 

"Fear  of  death,"  wrote  Hardie  afterwards,  "must 
have  been  an  invention  of  priestcraft.  He  is  the  grim 
king  for  those  who  are  left  to  mourn,  but  I  have  not  yet 
seen  a  deathbed,  and  I  have  seen  many,  where  the  White 
Herald  has  not  been  welcomed  as  a  friend  and  deliverer. 
These  two  talked  about  death  as  if  it  were  an  every  day 
incident  in  their  lives.  They  did  so  without  emotion,  or 
excitement,  or  interest  of  any  kind.  They  were  dying 
together,  whereat  they  were  glad.  Had  it  been  a  visit 
to  Glasgow,  three  miles  distant,  they  could  not  have 
been  more  unconcerned.  In  fact,  such  a  journey  would 
have  been  a  much  greater  annoyance  to  father.  They 
never  even  referred  to  any  question  of  the  Beyond.  As 
Socialists  they  had  lived  for  at  least  twenty-five  years, 
and  as  such  they  died  and  were  buried.  They  had 
fought  life's  battles'  together,  fought  them  nobly  and 
well,  and  it  was  meet  that  they  should  enter  the 
void  together." 

At  their  cremation  a  few  days  later,  Hardie  himself, 
amidst  a  gathering  of  mournful  friends  and  relations, 
spoke  the  last  parting  words  in  the  building  where 
thirteen  years  later  he  himself  was  to  be  carried.  Out- 
wardly he  was  calm,  inwardly  he  was  deeply  moved. 
"Henceforth,"  he  wrote,  "praise  or  blame  will  be  even 
less  than  ever  an  element  in  my  lifework.  Closed  for 
ever  are  the  grey  eyes  which  blazed  resentment  or  shed 
scalding  tears  when  hard,  untrue  things  were  spoken 
or  written  about  me  or  my  doings.  Silent  is  the  tongue 
which  well  knew  how  to  hurl  bitter  invectives  against 
those  who  spoke  with  the  tongue  of  slander,  and  stilled 
are  the  beatings  of  the  warm,  impulsive  heart  which 
throbbed  with  pride  and  joy  unspeakable  when  any  little 
success  came  her  laddie's  gait."  And  with  this  sense  of 

188 


NEVILL'S   COURT 

an  irreparable  void  in  his  life,  he  turned  to  work  once 
more. 

When  he  returned  to  London  he  found  it  necessary  to 
make  another  change  in  his  way  of  living.  The  friendly 
household  wherein  he  had  been  accustomed  to  sojourn 
during  the  Parliamentary  session,  had  been  broken  up, 
also  through  death's  visitation,  and  he  had  to  look  for 
a  new  home  in  London — a  home  which,  in  point  of 
rental,  would  not  be  too  expensive.  He  found  it,  after 
some  weeks'  house-hunting  all  over  London,  in  NevilFs 
Court,  Fetter  Lane,  off  Fleet  Street,  at  6s.  6d.  a  week. 
Within  a  stone's  throw  of  the  "Labour  Leader" 
London  office,  and  twenty  minutes'  walk  of  Westmin- 
ster, it  was  certainly  quite  near  his  daily  work,  and  yet 
as  remote  from  the  bustle  and  turmoil  of  modern  city 
life  as  if  it  were  a  survival  of  mediaeval  times  round 
which  the  new  world  had  built  itself — indeed,  it  was 
such  a  retreat.  It  was  a  tumble-down  structure  of  the 
fifteenth  or  sixteenth  century,  built  of  timber  and  plaster, 
and  of  a  most  uninviting  exterior.  Inside,  it  was  better. 
The  floor  of  the  room  had  been  kept  clean  by  honest 
scrubbing,  and  a  match-board  partition  had  been  put  up 
so  as  to  convert  the  large  room  into  a  sitting-room,  bed- 
room and  kitchen.  There  was  a  garden,  " thirty  inches 
wide  and  fifteen  feet  long,"  wherein  he  could  grow, 
and  actually  did  grow,  Welsh  leeks,  and  primroses 
and  gowans  transplanted  from  Cumnock.  In  a  short 
time,  artist  and  craftsman  friends  having  come  to  his  aid, 
"the  gnomes  were  driven  out  and  the  fairies  took  posses- 
sion and  transformed  this  corner  of  slumland  into  a  very 
palace  of  beauty."  "I  would  not,"  he  said  quaintly, 
"exchange  residences  with  his  most  gracious  majesty 
Edward  VII,  nor  deign  to  call  the  King  my  cousin"; 
and  here  he  settled  down  for  that  part  of  the  remainder  of 
his  life  which  had  to  be  spent  in  London.  Hither,  from 

189 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

all  parts  of  the  country,  aye,  from  all  parts  of  the  world, 
came  those  special  and  intimate  friends  who  were  of  the 
Keir  Hardie  fellowship.  Collier  folk  from  Wales  and 
from  Scotland  up  to  see  the  sights  of  London;  poets  and 
painters;  sculptors  and  literary  folk;  exiles  from 
Russia;  home-returning  travellers  from  Australia  or 
America,  came.  An  Indian  prince  at  one  time,  a  High- 
land crofter  at  another,  and,  of  course,  his  colleagues  of 
the  I.L.P.  Council  and  his  own  family  folk  from  Cum- 
nock  and  Cambuslang.  Never  was  any  notoriety-hunter 
or  newspaper  gossip-monger  able  to  break  into  this  sanc- 
tuary reserved  for  himself  and  his  intimates,  and  some- 
times for  himself  alone.  For  it  was  for  him  one  of  the 
attractions  of  this  retreat  that  he  could,  when  he  chose, 
be  alone  with  himself  and  his  own  thoughts.  "More 
than  irksome,  it  is  demoralising  to  live  always  under  the 
necessity  of  having  to  speak  and  be  spoken  to,  to  smile 
and  look  pleasant.  Companionship  is  good,  but  soli- 
tude is  best."  In  this  abode,  right  in  the  heart  of  the 
hurly-burly,  he  could  find  solitude. 

There  are  readers  of  this  book  who  will  be  grateful 
for  the  following  picture  of  Hardie  in  his  London  retreat 
as  limned  by  himself  on  one  of  his  nights  of  solitariness 
when  he  had  it  all  to  himself.  Incidentally,  also,  it  is 
somewhat  self-revealing.  :' These  jottings  are  made 
this  week"  ("Labour  Leader,"  June  2ist,  1902)  "in 
the  silence  and  solitude  of  my  London  mansion,  which  is 
the  envy  of  all  who  have  seen  it.  Outside,  the  barking 
of  a  dog  is  the  only  sound  which  disturbs  the  clammy 
night  air.  Despite  an  eighth  of  an  acre  of  sloping  roof, 
the  Toms  and  Tabbies  keep  a  respectful  silence. 
Within,  a  fire  burns  cheerily,  and  the  kettle  sings  on  the 
hob.  The  flickering  candlelight  throws  on  to  the  walls 
quavering  shadows  from  the  tall,  white-edged  and 
yellow-breasted  marguerites  (horse  gowans),  the  red 

190 


NEVILL'S   COURT 

seeding  stalks  of  the  common  sorrel,  the  drooping  yellow 
buttercups  and  the  graceful  long  grasses  which  fill  two 
graceful  gilt  measures  and  a  brown  mottoed  beer  jug. 
Here  and  there  big  purple  bells  and  ruby  roses  lend  a 
touch  of  needed  colour.  From  the  top  of  the  tea  caddy 
in  the  middle  shelf  within  the  deep  recesses  of  the  ingle 
nook,  the  dual  face  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  fashioned 
by  the  skilful  hands  of  Sydney  H.  Morse,  farmer, 
philosopher,  sculptor,  Socialist,  looks  sternly  philoso- 
phic from  his  right  eye  across  at  Walt  Whitman — a 
plaque  containing  a  perfect  replica  of  whose  features 
from  the  same  master-hand  hangs  opposite — whilst  with 
his  left  eye  the  genial  philosopher  winks  roguishly  at 
Robert  Burns  in  his  solitary  corner  near  the  window. 
Florence  Grove  lives  in  the  two  pictures  which  adorn  the 
wall,  as  does  Caroline  Martyn  in  the  transparency  for 
which  I  was  long  ago  indebted  to  our  energetic  com- 
rade, Swift,  of  Leeds,  whilst  big,  warm-hearted  Larner 
Sugden's  presence  can  be  felt  in  the  little  oak  table  with 
its  quaint  carvings.  Yes,  my  mansion  is  perfect.  The 
spirits  of  the  living  and  the  dead  whom  I  revere  are 
here.  Let  the  scoffers  and  the  Dyke  Lashmars  sneer 
(referring,  of  course,  to  the  character  of  that  name  in 
Gissing's  book).  To  me  it  is  as  much  a  fact  that  this 
room  was  built  for  me  hundreds  of  years  ago  as  if 
Robert  Williams  had  drawn  the  plans  to  my  orders, 
and  A.  J.  Penty  superintended  the  erection  of  the  build- 
ing. From  which  it  will  be  inferred  that  the  primitive 
instincts  of  the  race  are  still  strong  in  me.  And  now, 
as  Big  Ben  has  tolled  one,  and  the  dog  has  ceased  to 
bark,  I  will  smoke  one  pipe  more,  and  then  to  bed." 
The  beginning  of  June  brought  the  end  of  the  South 
African  War,  which  had  lasted  nearly  three  years 
instead  of  the  two  or  three  months  which  it  was  expected 
would  be  sufficient  for  the  subjugation  of  the  Boers. 

191 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Hardie,  and  with  him  the  I.L.P.,  had  never  swerved 
in  opposing  the  British  policy,  and  week  by  week,  both 
by  speech  and  pen,  he  had  supported  the  Boers  in  their 
resistance  to  the  superior  military  power  of  Great 
Britain.  He  regarded  such  resistance  not  only  as 
patriotic  from  the  Burghers'  point  of  view,  but  as  a 
service  to  humanity  in  its  necessary  struggle  against 
capitalist  Imperialism,  and  he  was  fain  to  discern  in  the 
terms  of  settlement  some  guarantee  for  the  development 
of  a  united  democracy  in  South  Africa.  Whether  or  not 
his  hopes  have  been  justified,  or  will  yet  be  justified, 
does  not  lie  within  the  province  of  this  book  to  say.  That 
chapter  of  history  is  not  closed  even  yet. 

With  the  end  of  the  war  there  came  a  marked  abate- 
ment in  the  jingo-fostered  prejudice  which  had  pre- 
vented Hardie  and  his  colleagues  from  getting,  even 
amongst  the  working  classes,  a  fair  hearing  for  their 
advocacy  of  the  principle  of  Labour  representation. 
They  were  not  now  so  frequently  assailed  with  the  epi- 
thet "pro-Boer, "  and  even  that  epithet,  when  applied, 
had  come  to  have  a  less  malignant  interpretation  in  the 
minds  of  men  who  were  beginning  to  perceive  that  under 
the  new  regime  South  Africa  was  not  likely  to  become 
the  paradise  for  British  labour  which  had  been  promised. 
~  The  importation  of  cheap  Central  African  native  labour, 
and  the  whisperings  already  heard  of  the  possible  intro- 
duction of  even  cheaper  and  more  servile  Chinese 
labour,  helped  to  confirm  the  contentions  so  persistently 
urged  by  Hardie  and  his  colleagues  on  hundreds  of 
platforms,  that  the  war  was  a  capitalists'  war,  fought  in 
the  interests  of  mineowners  and  financiers. 

There  was,  for  a  time,  a  decided  falling  away  of 
patriotic  fervour  on  the  part  of  the  working  classes, 
accelerated  by  a  steady  increase  in  the  number  of  un- 
employed, accompanied,  as  usual,  by  an  equally  steady 

192 


A   CAPITALISTS'   WAR 

decrease  in  wages.  To  many  it  seemed  as  if  the 
employing  classes  had  utilised  the  war  distractions 
to  consolidate  and  strengthen  their  own  position. 
New  combinations  of  employers  had  been  formed,  alike 
in  the  coal  trade,  the  steel  trade  and  the  textile  trade, 
which,  taken  together  with  the  law-court  attacks  upon 
the  workers'  right  of  combination,  had  all  the  appearance 
of  deliberate  and  well-conceiv.ed  class  war.  In  this 
atmosphere  of  chronic  discontent  the  argument  for  the 
attainment  of  political  power  became  more  and  more 
acceptable  to  organised  labour,  while  the  indifference  of 
both  the  Liberal  and  the  Tory  Parties  convinced  many 
that  such  power  could  only  be  achieved  through  the  Inde- 
pendent Labour  Party.  '"The  unopposed  return  of  David 
Shackleton,  of  the  textile  workers,  at  the  by-election  at 
Clitheroe  was  the  first  electoral  expression  of  a  change 
of  outlook  on  the  part  of  trade  unionists,  the  textile 
workers  having  been  hitherto  amongst  the  most  con- 
servative sections  of  the  workers.  /  Shackleton  was  not 
a  Socialist,  but  he  stood  definitely  as  an  independent 
L.R.C.  candidate,  and  there  was  significance  in  the  fact 
that  the  only  opponent  whom  the  Liberals  could  even 
venture  to  suggest  was  Mr.  Philip  Stanhope,  who  had 
been  an  out  and  out  opponent  of  the  war.  There  was 
good  reason  for  regarding  this  election,  not  only  as  a 
victory  for  Labour,  but  as  symptomatic  of  a  reaction 
from  Imperialism. 

Hardie  continued  to  be  active  both  with  speech  and 
pen,  and  did  not  seem  to  reckon  with  the  effects  of  the 
emotional  and  mental  strain  which  recent  events  had 
imposed  upon  him.  Probably  economic  considerations 
as  much  as  anything  else  prevented  him  from  taking 
the  rest  which  was  now  due,  for  the  "Labour  Leader," 
though  again  increasing  in  circulation,  was  not  prosper- 
ing financially,  and  he  had  difficulties  in  making  ends 

193 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

meet  which  were  not  revealed  except  to  very  close  con- 
fidants whose  lips  were  sealed  on  these  matters.  A 
prize  drawing,  originated  by  some  friends  to  aid  the 
funds  of  the  paper,  was  not  very  successful,  and  only 
served  to  show  that  all  was  not  well. 

In  September,  with  Mrs.  Hardie,  he  took  a  short 
holiday  in  the  West  Highlands,  the  rest-value  of  which 
he  spoilt  by  addressing  a  meeting  at  Ballachulish,  where 
a  long  drawn  out  dispute  between  the  quarrymen  and 
their  employers  was  in  progress,  the  details  of  which 
had  been  written  up  in  the  "Labour  Leader"  by  the 
present  writer.  In  November  he  was  medically  advised 
that  the  only  alternative  to  a  serious  breakdown  was 
that  he  should  go  away  for  a  complete  rest.  He  went 
for  a  week  or  two  to  the  Continent,  where  he  had  some 
experiences  which  were  anything  but  restful.  He  was 
present  at  a  duel  in  Paris  in  which  M.  Gerault  Richard, 
Socialist  deputy  and  editor  of  "La  Petite  Republique," 
was  one  of  the  principals.  He  found  excitement  in  the 
ferociously  elaborate  preparations,  and  much  amusement 
in  the  innocuous  outcome  thereof.  He  was  persuaded 
to  visit  the  opera,  and,  to  satisfy  Parisian  etiquette,  bor- 
rowed a  friend's  dress  suit,  probably  his  first  and  last 
appearance  in  such  apparel.  In  Brussels,  he  was  arrested 
on  suspicion  of  being  an  Anarchist  and  detained  for 
several  hours  until  he  could  show  that  he  was  a  Member 
of  the  British  Parliament  and  in  no  way  connected  with 
the  underworld  individual  who  had  recently  exploded 
some  blank  cartridges  in  the  vicinity  of  the  King  of  the 
Belgians.  It  was  a  good  holiday  with  plenty  of  change 
of  air,  scenery  and  circumstance,  but  decidedly  not 
restful. 

He  got  back  to  London  just  before  the  Christmas 
rising  of  the  House,  and  signalised  his  return  by 
endeavouring  to  have  the  question  of  the  unemployed 

194 


THE   UNEMPLOYED 

discussed  on  the  motion  for  adjournment.  He  was 
prevented,  however,  from  doing  so  by  the  Speaker's 
ruling,  a  decision  which  he  characterised  as  an  infringe- 
ment of  "the  unquestioned  right  of  members  of  the 
House  of  Commons  from  time  immemorial."  Before 
going  to  bed  he  wrote  a  long  letter  to  the  press  which 
appeared  in  "The  Times'5  and  several  other  London 
papers  the  next  morning.  In  this  he  demonstrated  from 
Board  of  Trade  statistics  and  trade  union  returns  that 
the  number  of  unemployed  workers  in  the  country  was 
not  less  than  half-a-million,  and  that  the  consequent 
wide-spread  distress  called  for  immediate  remedial 
measures  by  Parliament.  And  so  ended  a  year  which, 
for  him,  had  been  full  of  stress  and  distress,  but  ijot 
without  hope  and  encouragement  for  the  cause  he  had 
at  heart. 

With  the  opening  of  the  New  Year  there  came  a  change 
in  the  staff  of  the  "Labour  Leader"  which  must  be 
noted.  David  Lowe  ceased  to  be  assistant  editor,  a 
position  which  he  had  held  almost  ever  since  the  paper 
was  started  as  a  weekly.  Har3ie  said,  in  a  farewell  note  : 
"His  graceful  writings  and  his  business  capacity  have 
done  much  to  win  for  the  'Leader'  such  measure  of  suc- 
cess as  it  has  attained."  David  Lowe,  alike  by  his 
distinctive  quality  as  a  writer  and  his  close  connection 
with  the  "Leader"  in  its  early  years  of  struggle,  has  his 
rank  among  the  personalities  of  the  British  Socialist 
movement.  His  place  on  the  "Leader"  was  filled  by 
another  Dundee  man,  Mr.  W.  F.  Black,  a  journalist  of 
experience,  who,  having  become  a  convinced  Socialist, 
found  it  impossible  to  continue  as  sub-editor  of  the 
Liberal  "Dundee  Advertiser,"  the  more  especially  as 
he  had  been  recently  selected  as  Labour  candidate  for 
Dundee. 

As    the    weeks    passed,    the    unemployed    problem 

195 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

assumed  more  serious  dimensions,  the  discharged  soldiers 
from  South  Africa  helping  to  swell  the  already  formidable 
army  of  workless  folk.  On  Friday  and  Saturday,  Feb- 
ruary 22nd  and  23rd,  an  Unemployed  Conference  was 
held  at  the  Guildhall,  London,  attended  by  587  delegates 
from  town  councils,  corporations  and  Labour  organisa- 
tions, testifying  to  the  nation-wide  concern  created  by 
the  existing  distress.  At  the  various  sessions  of  the  Con- 
ference the  chairmen  were  Sir  Albert  Rollit,  M.P.,  Mr. 
Wilson,  Lord  Mayor  of  Sheffield,  and  Keir  Hardie,  no 
longer  standing  isolated  and  alone,  as  in  bygone  years. 
At  this  Conference,  Sir  John  Gorst  first  mooted  the  idea 
of  local  labour  employment  bureaux,  with  a  central  clear- 
ing house,  now  so  familiar  as  a  part  of  our  administrative 
mechanism.  It  should  be  said,  however,  that  Sir  John 
suggested  these  only  as  palliatives,  and  declared  that 
"though  the  symptoms  of  social  disorder  were  periodic, 
the  disorder  itself  was  chronic" — which  was  equivalent 
to  saying  that  it  was  inherent  in  the  capitalist  system. 

Hardie,  as  was  his  custom  when  there  was  a  chance 
of  getting  some  practical  work  done,  refrained  from  much 
speaking.  He  moved  "that  the  responsibility  for  finding 
work  for  the  unemployed  should  be  undertaken  jointly  by 
the  Local  Authorities  and  by  the  Central  Government, 
and  that  such  legislation  should  be  introduced  as  would 
empower  both  central  and  local  authorities  to  deal 
adequately  with  the  problem."  Other  resolutions  along 
the  same  line  were  adopted,  including  one  by  George  N. 
Barnes,  which,  if  it  had  effectively  materialised,  might 
have  given  the  Conference  some  real  and  lasting  value. 
"That  a  permanent  national  organisation  be  formed  to 
give  effect  to  the  decisions  of  the  Conference,  and  that 
the  Provisional  Committee  be  re-appointed  with  power 
to  add  to  its  number" — so  it  ran. 

This  Conference  was  important  chiefly  as  a  symptom  - 

196 


THE    UNEMPLOYED 

a  sign  that  the  r< condition  of  the  people"  question  was 
at  last  troubling  society.  Parliament  remained  wholly 
unresponsive,  and  this  period  of  distress,  like  so  many  of 
its  predecessors,  had  to  find  its  only  amelioration  in  soup 
kitchens,  stoneyards,  and  local  relief  works,  which,  as 
hitherto,  provided  a  minimum  of  useless  work  at  pauper 
wages.  Such  bodies  as  the  Salvation  Army  and  the 
Church  Army  found  a  vocation  in  distributing  charity. 

Even  in  this  work  Hardie  took  a  hand,  and  he  has 
related  pathetically  and  with  a  kind  of  sad  humour,  some 
of  his  experiences  delivering  Salvation  Army  tickets  in 
Fleet  Street  and  on  the  Embankment.  Not  infrequently 
he  spent  his  two  hours  beyond  midnight,  after  the  House 
had  risen,  assisting  at  one  or  other  of  the  Salvation  Army 
shelters,  thus  repeating,  under  more  heart-breaking  con- 
ditions, the  kind  of  work  he  had  performed  in  his  own 
Lanarkshire  village,  twenty-four  years  earlier.  The 
worst  thing  about  it  was  the  fatalistic  patience  of  the 
sufferers.  In  Lanarkshire,  the  men  and  women  were  at 
least  fighting.  These  crowds  of  helpless  atoms  had  no 
fight  in  them. 

All  this  time  he  was  toiling  like  a  galley-slave  on  the 
propaganda  platform.  Thus,  on  one  Friday  in  March, 
we  find  him  speaking  in  Browning  Hall,  London,  on 
Saturday  attending  a  National  Council  meeting  in  Man- 
chester, the  same  night  addressing  a  Labour  Church 
social  meeting  in  Bolton,  on  the  Sunday  speaking  in 
the  open  air  at  Farnworth  (in  March,  remember)  and  at 
night  in  the  Exchange  Hall  at  Blackburn.  On  the  Mon- 
day he  was  present  at  a  joint  committee  in  Westminster 
on  the  new  Trade  Union  Bill,  and,  in  the  evening,  he 
addressed  a  meeting  in  Willesden.  And  he  was  not  in 
good  health.  He  was  literally  giving  his  life  for  the 
cause.  Besides,  in  the  "Labour  Leader"  he  was  writ- 
ing more  than  ever  before. 

o  197 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

At  the  I.L.P.  conference,  held  at  York,  several 
changes  occurred  in  the  National  Council.  J.  Bruce 
Glasier  retired  from  the  chairmanship,  having  held  the 
position  for  three  years,  and  Philip  Snowden  was 
unanimously  elected  in  his  place.  Isabella  O.  Ford 
found  a  place  on  the  Council,  the  Party  thus  expressing 
in  a  practical  way  its  belief  in  sex  equality.  John  Penny, 
who  was  entering  into  business  on  his  own  account, 
retired  from  the  secretaryship,  having  given  invaluable 
services  to  the  Party  through  an  exceedingly  critical 
period  of  its  history.  His  place  was  filled  subsequently 
by  the  present  secretary,  Francis  Johnson. 

It  may  be  well  to  note  the  complete  personnel  of 
the  N.A.C.  at  this  juncture:  Chairman,  Philip  Snow- 
den;  Treasurer,  T.  D.  Benson;  members  of  Council,  J. 
Ramsay  MacDonald,  J.  Keir  Hardie,  J.  Bruce  Glasier, 
James  Parker,  Isabella  O.  Ford,  and  Fred  Jowett.  All, 
save  Hardie  and  Glasier,  are  still,  at  the  time  of 
writing,  alive,  and  all  except  Parker  have  remained 
loyal  to  the  I.L.P.  T.  D.  Benson  retired  from  the 
treasurership  only  last  year.  It  was  due  largely  to  his 
wise  counsel  and  business-like  handling  of  the  Party's 
finances  that  it  was  able  with  such  limited  resources  to 
do  so  much  effective  work  in  the  political  field.  He 
guided  the  Party  more  than  once  through  a  veritable  sea 
of  financial  troubles.  The  friendship  between  him  and 
Hardie  was  something  more  than  a  mere  political  com- 
radeship and  seemed  to  be  the  outcome  of  a  natural 
affinity  between  the  two  men, 

Though  Parliament  did  not  respond  legislatively  to 
the  claims  of  the  unemployed,  it  would  not  be  true  to 
say  that  these  claims  found  no  reflection  in  the  political 
world.  In  March,  Will  Crooks  was  returned  for  Wool- 
wich, and  in  July,  Arthur  Henderson  was  elected  for 
Barnard  Castle,  and  in  both  contests  the  unemployed 

198 


FREE   TRADE 

problem  was  a  prominent,  if  not  a  determining,  factor. 
Both  candidates  had  signed  the  L.R.C.  declaration,  and 
their  success,  in  the  one  case  against  a  Tory  and  in  the 
other  against  both  a  Liberal  and  a  Tory,  was  decidedly 
disconcerting  to  the  orthodox  party  politicians,  who, 
with  a  general  election  once  more  in  view,  had  to  find 
some  kind  of  a  political  programme  applicable  or  adapt- 
able to  the  social  conditions. 

The  great  fiscal  controversy  re-emerged  out  of  the 
discontents  of  the  people  and  the  opportunism  of  the 
statesmen.  Mr.  Chamberlain  produced  his  scheme  of 
colonial  preference,  and  in  doing  so  provided  both  his 
own  party  and  the  Liberals  with  a  cause  of  quarrel  cal- 
culated to  distract  the  attention  of  the  electorate  from 
the  new  Labour  Party  organisation,  and  re-establish  the 
old  party  lines  of  .division.  Before  the  end  of  the  year 
there  had  developed  a  raging,  tearing  platform  war  be- 
tween Liberals  and  Unionists  on  the  old  "Protection 
versus  Free  Trade"  issue,  by  means  of  which  both 
parties  hoped  to  rally  the  workers  behind  them.  Mr. 
Chamberlain  urged — we  must  believe  with  all  sin- 
cerity— that  in  his  proposals  lay  the  guarantee  against 
that  foreign  competition  which  was  supposed  to  be  the 
main  cause  of  dull  trade  and  therefore  of  unemploy- 
ment, and  that  with  this  security  of  employment  would 
come  good  wages.  He  suggested  further  that  the  Tariff 
imposts  would  provide  funds  for  Old  Age  Pensions. 
On  a  question  of  this  kind,  the  new  Labour  Party  could 
not  by  reason  alike  of  its  economic  principles  and  of  its 
hopes  for  international  goodwill,  avoid,  taking  the  Free 
Trade  side,  and  the  danger  was  that  by  doing  so  it 
would  lose  its  identity  and  become  merged  in  the  Liberal 
Party. .  Hardie  was  quick  to  descry  both  the  Chamber- 
lain fallacy,  and  the  Free  Trade  tactical  pitfalls.  "I 
am  no  fetish  worshipper  of  Free  Trade  in  the  abstract," 

199 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

he  said,  "but  I  know  enough  of  economics  and  of  his- 
tory to  convince  me  that  the  only  outcome  of  Chamber- 
lain's proposals  would  be  to  add  enormously  to  the  cost 
of  living,  without  any  prospect  whatever  of  wages 
getting  correspondingly  advanced.  J  The  dislocation  of 
trade  that  would  follow  any  attempt  to  set  up  a  Zoll- 
verein  would  throw  large  masses  of  men  out  of  employ- 
ment, which  again  would  react  in  the  lowering  of  wages. 
Protection  may  protect  rent  and  interest,  but  for  the 
worker,  under  a  competitive  system,  there  is  no  protec- 
tion save  that  which  the  law  gives  him.  It  is  to  be 
hoped,  all  the  same,  that  organised  Labour  will  not  be 
led  into  a  mere  Free  Trade  campaign  at  the  heels  of 
the  Cobden  Club.  A  constructive  industrial  policy  is 
demanded,  and  the  opportunity  is  one  that  should  not 
be  wasted  of  proving  that  Labour  can  be  creative  in 
legislation  as  well  as  destructive  in  criticism." 
^Naturally,  it  was  left  to  the  I.L.P.  to  formulate  and 
give  publicity  to  Labour's  alternative  constructive 
policy,  which,  as  was  to  be  expected,  took  the  form  of 
a  series  of  definitely  Socialist  proposals  of  a  practical 
kind.  '  An  extensive  platform  campaign  was  arranged 
and  successful  demonstrations  held  in  all  the  large 
towns  and  industrial  centres,  at  which  were  emphasised 
the  failure  of  protection  in  other  countries  to  relieve  or 
extenuate  the  poverty  of  the  workers,  and  the  equal 
failure  of  Free  Trade  in  this  country  to  give  security  of 
employment  or  improve  social  conditions.  '  The  workers 
were  asked  "to  assist  in  returning  Labour  Members  to 
Parliament  for  the  purpose  of  promoting  legislation  to 
nationalise  the  mines,  railways,  and  other  industrial 
monopolies,  in  order  that  the  wealth  created  may  be 
shared  by  the  community,  and  not  be  for  the  advantage 
of  the  rich  and  idle  classes." 

MacDonald  (who  had  written  for  the  Party  a  book 

200 


ILLNESS 

critically  examining  the  Chamberlain  proposals  for  an 
Imperial  Zollverein)  Snowden,  Jowett,  Barnes,  Glasier, 
and  most  of  the  leading  men  and  women  of  the  I.L.P. 
took  part  in  these  meetings,  but,  alas,  Hardie  was  not 
amongst  them.  By  the  time  the  campaign  commenced 
he  was  out  of  the  firing-line.  Whilst  in  Wales  amongst 
his  constituents,  he  was  taken  dangerously  ill.  The 
long-threatened,  long-evaded  collapse  had  come,  and  he 
had  to  give  in. 

The  trouble  was  diagnosed  as  appendicitis,  and  the 
doctors  decided  that  an  operation  was  necessary  if  his 
life  was  to  be  saved.  He  himself  well  knew  that  loss  of 
life  might  be  one  of  the  consequences  of  the  operation, 
and  though  he  took  it  quite  calmly,  the  same  know- 
ledge sent  fear  into  the  hearts  of  all  his  friends  and 
right  throughout  the  Socialist  movement  in  this  country 
and  in  other  lands.  The  highest  surgical  and  medical 
skill  was  secured,  and  there  was  something  like  a  sigh 
of  relief  when  it  was  made  known  that  the  operation 
had  been  successful.  Nor  was  the  expression  of 
sympathy  confined  to  the  Socialist  movement.  People 
of  every  shade  of  political  opinion,  and  in  every  grade 
of  society,  found  ways  and  means  of  showing  their  good- 
will. The  messages  of  sympathy  included  one  from 
Major  Banes,  his  former  opponent  at  West  Ham,  and 
one  from  King  Edward,  who  had  recently  undergone  a 
similar  ordeal.  For  the  time  being  political  enmities 
were — with  some  few  vulgar  exceptions — forgotten,  and 
it  was  generally  recognised  that  this  Labour  leader  was 
in  some  respects  a  national  possession  whose  character 
and  work  reflected  credit,  not  only  upon  the  class  from 
which  he  had  sprung,  but  upon  the  nation  of  which  he  was 
a  citizen.  A  prominent  Liberal  official  wrote,  on  the  eve 
of  the  operation  :  * '  Forgive  me  if  I  seem  to  be  impertinent 
in  forcing  myself  upon  your  notice  at  a  time  when  you 

201 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

have  more  than  enough  of  vastly  more  important  matters 
to  fill  your  mind  and  time.  But  I  am  sincerely  anxious 
that  all  will  go  well  with  you  to-morrow.  Never  was 
there  a  moment  in  the  recent  history  of  our  country  when 
your  great  powers  were  more  needed  in  the  field  of  active 
strife  than  now.  I  heartily  pray  that  the  operation  may 
be  in  every  way  successful.5'  John  Burns's  letter  was 
characteristic  : — 

"DearHardie, 

"I  am  pleased  to  hear  you  have  come  through  the 
operation  successfully.  This  illness  ought  to  be  a  warn- 
ing to  you,  and  to  others  similarly  engaged  who  do  not 
realise  the  wear  and  tear  of  such  a  life  as  ours.  Get 
well,  take  a  rest,  and  when  recovered  'tak  a  thocht  and 
mend.'  With  best  wishes  for  your  speedy  recovery,  the 
forcible  expropriation  of  your  pipe,  a  freedom  from 
articles,  and  an  immunity  from  'Marxian'  for  three 
months. 

1  'Yours  sincerely, 

"JOHN  BURNS." 

The  process  of  recovery  was  very  slow,  and  was  not 
accelerated  by  his  own  haste  to  get  on  his  legs  again. 
He  spent  several  seemingly  convalescent  weeks  in  a 
nursing  home  at  Falmouth,  and  managed  to  get  home 
to  Cumnock  for  the  New  Year.  "Marxian,"  of  the 
"Labour  Leader,"  who  met  him  in  London  on  Christ- 
mas Eve,  wrote  :  "All  Keir's  genuine  friends  should  still 
insist  that  he  should  continue  his  rest  from  active  work 
until  at  least  the  return  of  spring.  He  ought  really  to 
be  banished  to  the  Mediterranean  till  July  next.  As  it 
is,  he  is  going  on  to  Scotland  and  he  talks  of  doing  some 
platforming  before  the  end  of  January.  Anyone  who  is 
aiding  and  abetting  this  sort  of  thing  might  be  more 
eligibly  employed  stopping  rat  holes." 

202 


ILLNESS 


G 


His  Christmas  message  in  the  "Labour  Leader"  was 
of  the  nature  of  an  official  farewell  as  editor  and  pro- 
prietor. In  the  first  week  of  the  New  Year  the  paper 
passed  into  the  control  of  the  I.L.P.  and  became  the 
official  Party  organ,  thus  fulfilling  the  original  intention 
of  its  founder,  though  the  date  of  the  transference  was 
doubtless  determined  by  his  illness.']  "From  the  first/' 
he  wrote,  "it  has  been  my  intention  that  the  paper  should 
one  day  become  the  property  of  the  Independent  Labour 
Party.  That,  however,  I  thought  would  be  when  I  was 
no  more.  The  thought  of  parting  with  it  is  like  consent- 
ing to  the  loss  of  a  dearly  loved  child.  But  circum- 
stances are  always  bigger  than  personal  feelings.  I  have 
no  longer  the  spring  and  elasticity  of  a  few  years  ago, 
and  that  means  that  the  pressure  of  work  and  worry 
must  be  somewhat  relaxed.  But,  and  this  is  really  the 
deciding  factor,  the  interests  of  the  Party  require  that  it 
should  possess  its  own  paper.  The  events  of  the  past 
twelve  months  have  borne  this  fact  in  upon  me  with  irre- 
sistible force.  And  so,  subject  to  the  fixing  of  a  few 
unimportant  details,  the  'Labour  Leader'  will  pass  with 
this  issue  into  the  ownership  and  control  of  the  I.L.P. 
Time  was  when  this  would  have  been  a  risky  experiment. 
Now,  with  the  Party  organised  and  consolidated  as  it  is, 
the  risk  is  reduced  to  a  minimum.  For  the  I.L.P.  is  no 
longer  a  mixed  assortment  of  job  lots.  It  is  an  organisa- 
tion in  the  truest  sense  of  that  much  misused  word." 

Running  through  this  good-bye  note  there  is  a  discern- 
able  a  note  of  regret  that  the  good-bye  should  have  been 
necessary.  The  ''Labour  Leader"  was  one  of  his  tangi- 
ble achievements.  Something  concrete,  something  he 
could  lay  his  hands  upon  and  say,  "this  is  of  my  creation." 
He  had  put  the  stamp  of  his  own  character  upon  it,  and 
his  whole  soul  into  it.  "What  it  has  cost  me  to  keep 
it  going  no  one  will  ever  Enow,  and  few  be  able  even  to 

203 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

remotely  guess.  But  it  has  kept  going,  and  now  the 
Party  takes  it  over  as  a  self-supporting,  going  concern. 
I  am  proud  of  the  fact."  He  paid  full  tribute  to  those 
who  had  helped.  So  numerous  were  they  that  only  a 
few  could  be  singled  out — "Marxian/*  "who  has  never 
quailed,  and  even  now  would  like  to  see  the  thing  go 
on  on  personal  lines";  W.  F.  Black,  "who,  before  he 
joined  the  staff,  gave  much  valuable  voluntary  help,  and 
came  on  to  the  paper  at  considerable  pecuniary  sacrifice' ' ; 
his  brother  David,  "who  has  been  literally  a  pillar  and  a 
mainstay.  Had  he  not  been  there,  the  main  actors  would 
long  ago  have  had  to  succumb'';  David  Lowe,  "whose 
services  and  talents  were  freely  given  at  a  time 
when  they  were  much  needed' ';  William  Stewart 
(Gavroche),  "who  has  made  his  sign  manual  a  passport 
to  the  close  attention  of  every  thoughtful  reader." 

Of  course,  the  change  did  not,  by  any  means,  involve 
his  complete  severance  from  the  direction  of  the  affairs 
of  the  paper.  As  a  member  of  the  N.A.C.,  he  had  his 
share  with  the  others  in  the  control  of  its  policy,  and  his 
counsel  had,  naturally,  much  weight.  He  still  continued 
to  be  its  most  valued  contributor,  and  through  all  his 
remaining  years  he  found  in  the  "Labour  Leader"  his 
chief  medium  for  the  expression  of  his  convictions  on  all 
public  questions.  At  this  particular  juncture,  relief  from 
editorial  and  financial  responsibility  was  the  best  thing 
for  him  that  could  have  happened.  His  recovery  was 
slow  and  rest  was  imperative.  During  the  early  months 
of  1904,  he  spent  most  of  his  time  at  home  in  Cumnock, 
with  occasional  visits  to  Glasgow  and  Edinburgh.  On 
these  occasions  he  was  to  be  found  either  amongst  the 
second-hand  bookshops  adding  to  his  collection  of  Scot- 
tish Ballad  literature,  or  in  companionship  with  congenial 
friends  whose  doors  and  whose  hearts  were  always  open 
to  him.  William  Martin  Haddow  and  Alexander  Gil- 

204 


ILLNESS 

christ  in  Glasgow,  the  Rev.  John  Glasse  and  Mr.  John 
Young  in  Edinburgh,  and  many  others  besides,  had 
each  their  fireside  corner  ready  for  "Keir,"  and  he,  on 
his  part,  had  never  any  difficulty  in  making  himself  as 
one  of  the  family. 

At  home  in  Cumnock  he  had  his  family  around  him 
as  he  and  they  had  never  been  before.  He  had  his 
books,  and  his  garden,  and  his  dog,  and,  of  course,  his 
pipe,  and  when  the  weather  favoured  his  strolls  through 
the  collier  "raws,"  he  could  fight  the  early  battles  over 
again  amongst  old  comrades.  Occasionally  there  was  a 
day's  tramp  across  the  moors  towards  Glenbuck,  or  over 
the  hills  towards  Dalmellington.  But,  withal,  he  rallied 
back  to  health  very,  very  slowly.  He  had  been  too  near 
death's  door,  and  the  winter  weather  in  Scotland  is  not 
favourable  to  convalescence. 

So,  as  the  spring  advanced,  he,  with  some  reluctance, 
agreed  that  a  complete  change  of  air  and  scene  was 
essential.  Thus  it  came  about  that  early  in  March  he 
was  en  route  for  the  Riviera,  via  France  and  Switzer- 
land, with  J.  R.  MacDonald  as  his  companion  on  the 
first  stages  of  his  journey. 

It  was  his  first  holiday  free  from  political  or 
propagandist  objective,  and  he  enjoyed  it  thoroughly, 
especially  the  last  month,  spent  entirely  at  Bordighera, 
which  he  described  as  "the  most  charming  spot  in  the 
Riviera,"  an  impression  due  perhaps  in  some  degree  to 
the  human  companionship  which  he  found  there. 

"At  Bordighera  I  was  met  by  the  Gentle  Prince  of 
the  Golden  Locks,  and  conducted  to  his  marble- 
pillared  palace,  with  its  beautiful  arched  and  vaulted 
ceilings  and  tiled  floors.  There  I  met  the  Boy  Corsair 
of  the  Kaurie  Hand — a  stalwart  viking,  a  true  son  of 
the  sea — and  the  Bold  Brigand  of  the  Mountains,  to  all 
of  whom  I  owe  much.  In  plain  language,  they  are 

205 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

two  young  artists  and  a  poet,  all  striving  after  the  real 
and  true  in  life  and  living.  There  also  came  Africanus 
Brown,  the  Good  Physician,  who  literally  brought 
healing  in  his  presence.  The  memory  of  Bordighera 
and  its  warm  hearts  will  long  remain  fresh  and  green 
with  me." 

Week  by  week  during  these  three  months  he  contri- 
buted to  the  "Labour  Leader"  descriptive  sketches  of 
his  experiences  and  impressions  which,  of  course,  can- 
not even  be  summarised  here.  They  would  still  bear 
reproduction  in  book  form.  There  are  "men  of  letters" 
whose  literary  fame  is  built  upon  foundations  almost  as 
slender. 

At  Mentone  he  had  an  interview  with  the  exiled 
ex-President  Kruger  and  "was  impressed  with  the 
stately  dignity  of  the  man,  an  exile  from  the  land  he 
loves  so  well  and  from  the  people  whom  he  has  welded 
into  a  nation." 

June  had  begun  when  he  returned  home,  much 
the  better  for  his  holiday,  but  even  then  not  fully 
restored  to  health.  "Keir  Hardie,"  one  parliamentary 
correspondent  wrote,  on  June  24th,  "is  back  again  this 
week,  but  though  he  looks  well,  we  are  all  sorry  to  hear 
that  he  is  not  so  well  as  he  looks." 

Nevertheless,  he  had  come  back  to  work,  though  for 
the  next  two  years  more  outside  of  the  House  than 
inside. 

For  the  first  time  since  the  I.L.P.  was  formed,  he 
was  absent  from  its  annual  conference,  held  this  year 
at  Cardiff.  There  was  universal  and  sincere  regret  for 
his  absence,  but  also  general  agreement  that  in  the 
circumstances  the  Riviera  was  a  better  place  for  him 
than  South  Wales.  He  was,  as  a  matter  of  course,  re- 
elected  to  the  N.A.C.  Mrs.  Pankhurst  was  also  amongst 
the  successful  candidates,  thus  adding  one  more  force- 

206 


ILLNESS 

ful  personality  to  a  body  already  fairly  well  equipped 
with  such.  Mrs.  Pankhurst,  who  had  been  a  member 
of  the  Party  since  its  formation,  was  now  beginning  her 
special  activities  in  the  Women's  Suffrage  movement 
and  made  no  secret  of  her  intention  to  subordinate  all 
other  aims  to  its  furtherance.  Subsequent  develop- 
ments make  it  necessary  to  note  this  fact. 


207 


CHAPTER  NINE 

THE  CLASS  WAR  IN  THEORY  AND  PRACTICE 

BEFORE  many  months  were  over,  Hardie  was 
back  again  on  the  Continent,  not  this  time  in 
search  of  health,  but  to  play  his  part  in  the  Inter- 
national Congress  at  Amsterdam.  It  was  said  at  the 
time  that  the  Amsterdam  Congress  would  be  historical 
because  of  the  great  debate  on  international  Socialist 
tactics.  That  is  true,  but  not  in  the  sense  anticipated. 
Probably,  the  real  historical  interest  in  the  Amsterdam 
Congress  lies  in  the  fact  that  it  revealed  deep  schisms 
within  the  "International"  itself  which  rendered  that 
body  wholly  impotent  when  the  supreme  testing  time 
came  ten  years  later.  These  divisions  were  most  evident 
amongst  the  delegates  from  France  and  Germany,  the 
two  countries  where  Socialism  had  been  most  successful 
in  its  efforts  for  Parliamentary  representation. 

In  France,  one  section,  led  by  Jaures,  on  the  ground 
that  the  Republic  was  in  danger  and  that  clericalism 
was  an  ever-active  menace  to  democracy,  had  been  sup- 
porting the  Anti-Clerical  Ministry,  though  Jaures  him- 
self never  took  office.  Another  section,  led  by  Jules 
Guesde,  was  opposed  to  any  appearance  of  alliance  with 
the  Government.  In  Germany,  the  critical  examination 
of  Marx  by  Bernstein  had  been  causing  trouble,  and  the 
German  Party  at  its  annual  conference  in  Dresden  the 
previous  year,  had  by  an  overwhelming  vote  condemned 
what  it  called  Revisionist  tendencies.  At  the 
Amsterdam  Congress  the  German  Party  and  the  French 

208 


THE   CLASS   WAR 

Guesdists  joined  forces  to  make  the  German  resolu- 
tion international  and  applicable  to  Socialists  in  all 
countries  without  regard  apparently  to  differing  circum- 
stances, political,  economic,  or  historical.  In  reality 
the  resolution  was  aimed  at  Jaures  and  his  section.  It 
declared  the  class  war  to  be  ever  increasing  in  virulence 
and  condemned  Revisionist  tendencies  and  Jaures' 
tactics.  Bebel,  Kautsky,  Jaures,  Adler,  Vandervelde, 
MacDonald,  all  took  part  in  this  debate.  It  was  a 
veritable  battle  of  giants,  and  for  that  reason,  memor- 
able to  those  who  were  present.  We  are  only  concerned, 
however,  with  the  attitude  of  Hardie  and  the  I.L.P. 
towards  this  question  of  Socialist  tactics.  The  I.L.P. 
was,  in  its  own  tactics,  as  much  opposed  as  the  Germans  V 
and  the  Guesdists  to  Socialist  participation  in  capi- 
talist governments,  but  it  had  never  affirmed  that  such 
tactics  should  be  universally  applicable  nor,  even  in 
any  one  country,  unalterable.  In  the  case  under  debate, 
its  delegates  to  the  Congress  held  that  the  Socialist 
movement  in  each  country  must  decide  what  its  tactics 
should  be,  that  any  attempt  by  the  International  Con- 
gress to  prescribe  a  given  line  of  action  would  settle 
nothing,  and  that,  indeed,  in  any  country  where 
Socialists  themselves  were  strongly  divided  on  the 
matter,  such  an  attempt  would  only  tend  to  deepen 
the  division.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there  was  a  strong 
desire  amongst  the  rank  and  file  of  the  French  Socialists 
for  unity,  and  Jaures  having  been  defeated  by  but  the 
smallest  majority,  no  resentment  was  caused  by  the 
debate  and  vote.  The  immediate  result  was  to  unite 
the  French  Party  and  make  possible  for  it  those  years 
of  political  success  with  which  the  name  of  Jaures  will 
be  for  ever  associated.  The  result  in  Germany  was  nil. 
The  controversy  between  the  orthodox  Marxian  and  the 
Revisionist  continued  and  produced  barrenness. 

209 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Moreover,  the  I.L.P.  had  never  accepted  the  class 
war  as  an  essential  dogma  of  Socialist  faith,  and  its 
delegates  could  not  support  a  resolution  embodying 
that  dogma."!  In  the  British  section,  which  comprised 
delegates  from  the  I.L.P.,  the  L.R.C.,  the  S.D.F.  and 
the  Fabians,  and  over  which  Hardie  presided,  all  this 
had  to  be  debated  with  a  view  to  deciding  on  which 
side  the  votes  of  the  section  would  be  cast,  and  there 
were  stormy  scenes  within  the  section  as  well  as  in  the 
Congress.  In  the  end,  there  was  some  kind  of  com- 
promise, and  the  vote  of  the  section  was  given  in  favour 
of  an  amendment  by  Vandervelde,  of  Belgium,  and 
Adler,  of  Austria,  which,  whilst  affirming  the  whole 
doctrine  of  Socialism  and  accepting  the  Kautsky  reso- 
lutions as  determining  the  tactics  of  the  movement,  left 
out  those  portions  which  condemned  revision.  This 
amendment  was  defeated,  but,  as  was  afterwards  pointed 
out,  by  the  votes  of  nations  which  either  had  no  par- 
liamentary system,  or  no  strong  Labour  Party  in 
Parliament.  The  only  European  nations  having 
parliamentary  institutions  which  voted  against  it  were 
Germany  and  Italy.  "This,"  said  Hardie,  "is  a  fact  of 
the  first  significance  and  indicates  clearly  what  the  future 
has  in  store  for  the  movement. "  Some  part  of  that  future 
has  already  disclosed  itself.  The  attempt  to  find  a  com- 
mon measure  of  tactics  for  countries  so  widely  separated 
in  industrial  and  political  development  as  Russia  and 
Germany,  or  Russia  and  Great  Britain,  is  doomed  to 
failure.  Tactics  must  be  determined  by  circumstances 
and  events. 

There  were  two  incidents  in  connection  with  this  Con- 
ference of  perhaps  even  greater  significance  than  the 
debate  on  tactics.  One  was  the  public  handshaking  of  the 
delegates  from  Japan  and  Russia,  whose  countries  were  at 
that  time  at  war.  The  other  was  the  appearance  for  the 

210 


THE   CLASS   WAR 

first  time  at  an  international  congress  of  a  representative 
from  India,  rn  the  person  of  Naoroji,  who  delivered  a 
strong  indictment  of  British  methods  of  government  in 
India. 

A  sequel  to  the  Congress  was  the  necessity  which  it 
imposed  upon  Hardie  of  stating  more  clearly  than  ever 
before  his  views  on  the  question  of  political  tactics,  and 
also  on  the  question  of  the  Class  War.  On  the  former, 
it  will  be  best  to  give  his  own  words.  The  following 
quotation  from  an  article  which  he  contributed  to 
the  "Nineteenth  Century"  will  serve  the  purpose  :  "The 
situation,  as  revealed  by  the  voting  at  Amsterdam  is  this. 
Wherever  free  Parliamentary  institutions  exist,  and 
where  Socialism  has  attained  the  status  of  being  recog- 
nised as  a  Party,  dogmatic  absolutism  is  giving  way 
before  the  advent  of  a  more  practical  set  of  working 
principles.  The  schoolman  is  being  displaced  by  the 
statesman.  No  har.d  and  fast  rule  can  be  laid  down  for 
the  application  of  the  new  methods,  but  generally  speak- 
ing, where  the  Socialist  propaganda  has  so  far  succeeded 
as  to  have  built  up  a  strong  party  in  the  state,  and  where 
the  ties  which  kept  the  older  parties  together  have  so 
far  been  dissolved  that  there  is  no  longer  an  effective 
Reform  Party  remaining,  there  the  Socialists  may  be 
expected  to  lend  their  aid  in  erecting  a  new  combination 
of  such  progressive  forces  as  give  an  intellectual  assent 
to  Socialism,  and  are  prepared  to  co-operate  in  waging 
war  against  reaction  and  in  rallying  the  forces  of  demo- 
cracy. When  this  can  be  done  so  as  in  no  way  to  impair 
the  freedom  of  action  of  a  Socialist  party,  or  to  blur  the 
vision  of  the  Socialist  ideal,  it  would  appear  as  if  the 
movement  had  really  no  option  but  to  accept  its  share 
of  the  responsibility  of  guiding  the  State.  Then,  just 
in  proportion  as  Socialism  grows,  so  will  the  influence  of 
the  representatives  in  the  national  councils  increase,  and 

211 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

the  world  may  wake  up  some    morning    to    find    that 
Socialism  has  come." 

Complementary  to  the  foregoing  statement  must  be 
taken  his  almost  simultaneous  declaration  in  the  "Labour 
Leader,"  that  he  could  not  conceive  of  any  set  of  circum- 
stances as  likely  to  arise  in  his  lifetime  which  would  lead 
phim  to  agree  to  an  alliance  with  any  Party  then  existing. 

^/  L'ln  Great  Britain,  for  the  present,  there  is  no  alternative 
to  a  rigid  independence." 

.This  declaration  occurred  in  "An  Indictment  of  the 
Class  War,"  which  extended  through  two  articles  in  the 

^/"Leader."     In  this  "indictment"  he  maintained  that  to 
claim  for  the  Socialist  movement  that  it  is  a  "class  war" 
dependent  upon  its  success  upon  the  the  "class    con- 
sciousness" of  one  section  of  the  community,  was  doing 
Socialism  an  injustice  and  indefinitely  postponing  its 
triumph.     It  was,  he  said,  in  fact,  lowering  it  to  the  level 
of    a    faction    fight.       He    objected  to  the  principle  of 
Socialism  being  overlaid  by  dogmatic  interpretation.   He 
agreed,  of  course,  that  there  was  a  conflict  of  interests 
between  those  who  own  property  and  those  who  work 
for   wages,   but   contended  that  it   was  the   object   of 
Socialism  to  remove  the  causes  which  produced    this 
antagonism.      "Socialism,"  he  said,  "makes  war  upon 
a  system,  not  upon  a  class,"  and  one  of  the  dangers  of 
magnifying  the  class  war  dogma  was  that  it  led  men's 
minds  away  from  the  true  nature  of  the  struggle.     "The 
working  class,"  he  said,  "is  not  a  class.    It  is  a  nation"; 
and,  "it  is  a  degradation  of  the  Socialist  movement  to 
drag  it  down  to  the  level  of  a  mere  struggle  for  supremacy 
between  two  contending  factions."  He  quoted  Belfort  Bax 
as  saying  that  "mere  class  instinct  which  is  anti-social, 
can  never  give  us  Socialism,"  and  he  referred  to  Jaures 
as  declaring  that  out  of  49,000,000  people  in  France, 
not  200,000  were  class-conscious  Socialists,  and  to  Lieb- 

212 


THE   CLASS  WAR 

knecht  as  saying  the  same  thing  about  Germany,  and  he 
queried,  "When  are  the  proletarians  to  become  class 
conscious  ?"  He  deduced  from  these  facts,  and  from 
the  philosophic  arguments  of  Bax  and  Morris,  that 
"Socialism  would  come,  not  by  a  war  of  classes,  but  by 
economic  circumstances  forcing  the  workers  into  a  revolt 
which  will  absorb  the  middle  class  and  thus  wipe  out 
classes  altogether."^ 

Speaking  of  the  ^Communist  Manifesto,"  upon  which 
the  class  war  dogma  is  said  to  be  based,  he  quoted  the 
statement  of  Engels,  one  of  its  authors,  that  "the  prac- 
tical application  of  the  principles  of  the  manifesto  will 
depend  on  the  historical  conditions  for  the  time  being 
existing,"  and  he  recalled  that  the  famous  document  was 
written  in  1847,  "when  Europe  was  a  seething  mass  of 
revolutionary  enthusiasm." 

Of  the  manifesto  itself,  he  contended  that,  however 
correct  it  might  be  as  a  form  of  words,  it  was  lacking 
in  feeling  and  could  not  now  be  defended  as  being 
scientifically  correct,  inasmuch  as  the  materialist  theory 
therein  expounded  made  -no  allowance  for  the  law  of 
growth  or  development.  He  agreed  that  the  emancipa- 
tion of  the  working  class  must  be  the  act  of  the  working 
class  itself,  but  contended  that  in  this  country  the  " 
workers  had  already  politically  the  power  to  free  them- 
selves, and  that  it  was  the  ignorance  of  the  workers  which 
hindered  the  spread  of  Socialism.  That  ignor- 
ance we  were  now  called  upon  to  attack  with  every 
weapon  at  our  command,  and  it  was  because  the  class 
war  dogma  led  the  workers  to  look  outside  themselves 
for  the  causes  which  perpetuated  their  misery  that  he 
opposed  its  being  made  a  leading  feature  in  Socialist 
propaganda.  .  That  Socialism  was  revolutionary  was 
indisputable,  but  he  maintained  that  reformative  im- 
provements in  the  workers'  conditions  did  not  necessarily 

*  213 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

weaken  the  revolutionary  purpose  of  Socialism.  He 
denied  that  revolution  required  the  violent  overthrow 
of  the  bourgeoisie  by  open  war.  "No  revolution  can 
succeed  which  has  not  public  opinion  behind  it,  and 
when  that  opinion  ripens,  it,  as  we  have  seen  over  and 
over  again,  breaks  down  even  the  walls  of  self-interest." 

Naturally,  this  "indictment"  provoked  a  storm  of 
controversy  within  the  movement.  ;  In  this  controversy 
Hardie  did  not  again  intervene.  He  had  defined  his 
attitude  towards  the  class  war  theory,  and  he  left  it  at 
that.  Theoretical  disputation  amongst  Socialists  was 
distasteful  to  him.  He  was  always  more  in  his  element 
fighting  the  avowed  enemies  of  Socialism  than  in 
quarrelling  with  its  friends.  Even  in  fighting  its  enemies 
his  desire  was,  if  it  were  possible,  to  make  friends  of 
them,  and  in  this  he  was  not  always  unsuccessful. 

There  was  no  lack  of  problems,  political  and  social, 
calling  for  immediate  attention — problems  the  equitable 
solution  of  which  meant  the  removal  of  obstacles  in  the 
path  towards  Socialism.  Amongst  these,  the  question 
of  political  sex-equality  was  one  of  the  most  important, 
and  was  now  nearing  the  stage  when  Parliament  could 
not  neglect  it  much  longer.  This  question  illustrated, 
though  he  never  used  it  in  that  way,  Hardie's  conten- 
tions concerning  the  class  war.  The  vote  was  demanded, 
not  for  working  women  only,  but  for  all  women, 
irrespective  of  class.  It  is  true  that  a  strong  argument 
in  its  favour  was  the  large  place  now  occupied  by 
women  in  the  industrial  field,  their  share  in  the  staple 
trade  of  Lancashire  being  specially  cited  as  proof  of 
their  right  to  the  vote,  but  sex  equality  was  and  has 
always  been  the  basis  of  the  demand  for  women's  suf- 
frage. Political  equality  with  men  had  been  demanded 
not  on  the  grounds  of  special  industrial  or  social 
service,  but  as  a  common  citizen  right.  Yet  in  the  very 

214 


THE  CLASS  WAR 

fact  of  agreement  on  this  fundamental  principle,  there 
lay  the  germs  of  a  disagreement  out  of  which  arose  much 
confusion  and  friction  within  the  suffragist  movement 
itself.  Political  equality  with  men,  but  how?  By 
pressing  for  "adult  suffrage, "  which,  of  course,  included 
both  sexes,  or  by  demanding  the  franchise  for  women 
on  the  existing  basis  for  men,  namely,  household 
franchise. 

The  I.L.P.,  of  course,  favoured  both,  political 
equality  being  inherent  in  its  conception  of  social 
equality,  and  the  National  Council,  with  a  view  to 
securing  legislation  which  would  not  only  enfranchise 
women  as  householders,  but  alsb  entitle  them  to 
equality  with  men  in  any  future  extension  of  the 
franchise,  had  drafted  a  Women's  Enfranchisement 
Bill  to  be'introduced  by  Hardie  at  the  first  opportunity. 
As  this  is  a  matter  of  historical  interest  the  text  of  the 
Bill  may  be  given.  It  was  as  follows  : — 

"In  all  Acts  relating  to  the  qualification  and  registra- 
tion of  persons  entitled  to  vote  for  the  election  of 
Members  of  Parliament,  whatever  words  occur  which 
import  the  masculine  gender,  shall  be  held  to  include 
women  for  all  purposes  connected  with  and  having 
reference  to  the  right  to  be  registered  as  voters,  and  to 
vote  in  such  election  any  law  or  usage  to  the  contrary 
notwithstanding." 

There  was  division  of  opinion  as  to  the  wisdom  of 
this  line  of  advance  both  within  the  women's  movement 
and  within  the  I.L.P.  The  Women's  Social  and  Politi- 
cal Union,  in  which  Mrs.  Pankhurst  was  the  dominant 
force,  favoured  the  policy  embodied  in  the  above  Bill, 
which  came  to  be  known  as  the  Limited  Suffrage  Bill. 
The  Adult  Suffrage  League,  which  included  amongst 
its  leading  members  Margaret  Bondfield  and  Mary 
Macarthur,  stood,  as  its  name  implies,  for  nothing  short 

215 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

of  adult  suffrage.  Hardie,  knowing  well  that  neither 
proposal  would  be  carried  without  great  opposition, 
favoured  the  "limited"  proposal,  chiefly  for  agitational 
purposes.  "If,"  he  said,  "the  women  have  a  Bill  of 
their  own,  short,  simple,  and  easily  understood,  and  they 
concentrate  upon  that,  even  though  it  should  never  be 
discussed  in  Parliament  until  the  general  Adult  Suffrage 
Bill  is  reached,  they  would,  by  their  agitation,  have 
created  the  necessary  volume  of  public  opinion  to  make 
it  impossible  for  politicians  to  overlook  their  claims." 
In  the  main  this  was  the  view  held  by  the  Party,  and 
adhered  to  throughout  the  subsequent  stormy  period  of 
agitation  for  women's  rights.  This  storm,  however,  was 
as  yet  only  brewing. 

More  immediate  were  the  threatenings  of  trouble 
from  the  growing  hosts  of  unemployed  workers.  In 
September,  Hardie,  in  Parliament,  had  called  the 
attention  of  the  Government  to  the  fact  that  the  unem- 
ployed problem  could  not  be  much  longer  ignored,  and 
had,  as  usual,  been  assured  by  Mr.  Balfour  that  "there 
was  no  evidence  of  exceptional  distress."  Almost  imme- 
diately, as  if  in  answer  to  this  assertion,  the  unemployed 
themselves  contradicted  it  with  a  degree  of  violence 
reminiscent  of  the  times  of  the  Chartist  movement. 
In  Manchester,  Birmingham,  Leeds,  Liverpool,  Glas- 
gow and  most  of  the  big  towns,  not  only  were  there 
large  processions  of  workless  people  demanding  that 
the  civic  authorities  should  take  action  for  their  relief, 
but  also  daily  gatherings  of  these  people  in  public 
places.  At  Leeds,  during  one  procession,  windows 
were  broken  all  along  the  line  of  march.  On  the  whole, 
however,  the  demonstrations  were  orderly,  and,  thanks 
largely  to  the  local  I.L.P.  organisations,  which  usually 
took  control,  the  unemployed  agitation  began  to  assume 
an  organised  and  cohesive  character  such  as  had  been 

216 


THE    UNEMPLOYED 

lacking  in  previous  periods  of  trade  depression.  Hardie 
was  much  in  evidence  both  in  the  outside  agitation  and 
in  Parliament,  and  it  looked  as  if  the  very  imminence  of 
trouble  and  the  call  for  leadership  had  restored  him  to 
full  health  and  vigour.  He  declared — referring  to  the 
trouble  at  Leeds — that  "if  Parliament  deliberately  rules 
these  men  as  being  outside  its  ken,  they  are  justified  in 
refusing  to  be  bound  by  laws  made  for  the  protection  of 
well-to-do  people." 

By  the  middle  of  October,  the  Government  had 
slightly  changed  its  tune,  and  Mr.  Long,  the  President 
of  the  Local  Government  Board,  had  called  a  confer- 
ence of  the  Guardians  and  Borough  Councillors  of  the 
Metropolitan  area  to  consider  the  situation.  This  was 
immediately  followed  up  by  Hardie  with  a  memorial 
signed  by  fourteen  Members  of  Parliament  asking  for 
a  special  session,  and  with  a  pamphlet  in  which  he  dealt 
comprehensively  with  the  unemployed  problem,  detailed 
the  powers  already  possessed  by  local  authorities  and 
Boards  of  Guardians,  and  made  suggestions  for  their 
immediate  utilisation.  He  also  considered  the  larger 
question  of  what  the  Government  itself  could  do  if  it 
were  willing,  and  proposed  the  creation  of  a  new  State 
Department  with  a  Minister  pi  Industry,  and  a  new  set 
of  administrative  councils,;  to  initiate  work  and  take 
in  charge  lands  and  foresKbres,  afforestation,  building 
harbours  of  refuge,  making  new  roads,  and  so  on — in 
fact,  a  practical  programme  of  remedies,  just  falling  "' 
short  of  Socialism  but  leading  inevitably  towards  it,  and 
proving  that  he  was  no  dreamer  but  simply  a  very 
practical  man  far  in  advance  of  his  time.  Upon 
this  programme  the  November  Municipal  Elections 
were  fought,  and  resulted  in  a  considerable  increase  in 
the  number  of  Labour  representatives  on  Town  Coun- 
cils throughout  the  country,  a  result  which  was  taken 

217, 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

as  foreshadowing  what  was  likely  to  happen  at  the  first 
Parliamentary  general  election. 

All  through  the  winter  the  agitation  continued,  and 
contrary  to  the  usual  experience,  did  not  slacken  off  in 
the  spring.  In  April,  the  Government  produced  its 
"Unemployed  Workmen  Bill,"  and  in  so  doing  con- 
ceded for  the  first  time  the  principle  for  which  Hardie 
had  fought  ever  since  1893,  the  principle  of  State  res- 
ponsibility for  the  unemployment  problem.  As  was  to 
be  expected,  the  measure  was  not  of  a  very  drastic 
character.  It  followed  the  lines  of  Mr.  Long's  sugges- 
tions of  six  months  previously,  and  authorised  local 
Councils  to  set  up  Distress  Committees  and  Relief 
Committees  to  be  financed  by  voluntary  subscriptions 
and  by  a  local  rate  not  to  exceed  one  penny  in  the  pound 
of  assessed  rental.  Unsatisfactory  as  the  Bill  was, 
Hardie  recommended  that  it  should  be  accepted,  and 
as  far  as  possible  improved  in  Committee.  He  knew  well 
that  its  very  shortcomings  would  give  rise  to  further 
discontent  and  intensify  rather  than  allay  the  outside 
agitation  upon  which  he  mainly  relied  for  forcing  the 
local  authorities  to  do  something  practical,  and  for  ex- 
posing the  insincerity  of  the  Government.  The  Liberals, 
when  in  power,  he  constantly  reminded  his  audiences, 
had  been  quite  as  futile  as  the  Tories  in  their  dealings 
with  unemployment,  f  Hardie  was  undoubtedly,  before 
everything  else,  an  agitator,  and  in  this  respect  was  a 
continual  puzzle  to  the  Continental  Socialists,  who 
\  found  difficulty  in  reconciling  his  professed  rejection  of 
the  class  war  theory  with  what  seemed  to  them  his  ever 
militant  application  of  it,  and  when  in  the  autumn  the 
Government  threatened  to  withdraw  the  Unemployment 
Bill,  and  Hardie  made  such  an  uproar  in  the  House  as 
compelled  them  to  go  on  with  it,  and  arrested  the  atten- 
tion of  the  whole  country,  the  Continental  Socialist 

218 


THE    UNEMPLOYED 

press  was  unstinted  in  its  praise  of  his  courage  and  of 
his  tactics^  albeit  somewhat  mystified  by  the  apparent 
inconsistency  of  his  parliamentary  practice  with  his 
congress  professions.  He  was,  in  fact,  doing  as  he  had 
always  done,  facing  the  immediate  issue  and  utilising 
the  circumstances  of  the  moment  for  the  purpose  of 
far  reaching  propaganda. 

Agitation  with  Hardie  was  almost  a  fine  art,  and 
always  led  on  to  more  agitation,  with  an  objective  ever 
beyond.  In  the  present  case  the  objective  was  the 
coming  general  election.  (J[t  was  to  this  end  that  he 
created  scenes  in  the  House  of  Commons  over  the 
Unemployed  Bill  and  the  bludgeoning  of  unemployed 
demonstrations,  rousing  to  anger  the  jeering  back-4 
bench  Tories  by  describing  them  to  their  faces  as  "well 
fed  beasts."  'It  was  to  this  end  that  he,  with  the  I.L.P., 
projected  a  great  series  of  demonstrations  in  support  of 
the  Bill  to  be  held  simultaneously  all  over  the  country. 
"Public  opinion,"  he  said,  "is  a  manufactured  article, 
and  represents  that  amount  of  agitation  and  education 
which  any  given  cause  has  been  able  to  exert  upon  the 
community."  The  devoted  and  tireless  members  of  the 
I.L.P.  had  been  supplying  the  agitation  and  education 
for  years.  He  believed  that  public  opinion  was  now  in 
existence  which  would  establish  a  substantial  Party  in 
Parliament  at  the  first  opportunity,  and  he  was  looking 
forward  hopefully  to  that  event.  Already  he  had  a 
glimpse  of  what  might  be  possible  with  such  a  Party. 
In  these  latter  months  he  was  no  longer  fighting  single- 
handed  and  lonely.  The  new  Labour  Members,  Hen- 
derson, Crooks,  and  Shackleton  had  been  co-operating 
with  him  loyally  and  steadily,  and  his  parliamentary 
work  had  been  more  congenial  than  ever  before.  His 
hopes  were  high,  and  he  radiated  optimism  throughout 
the  movement. 

219 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

The  Unemployment  Bill  passed,  but  was  rendered 
practically  ineffective  by  the  accompanying  "Regula- 
tions" and  by  the  reluctance  of  local  authorities  to  put 
it  into  operation,  and,  as  Hardie  anticipated,  the  general 
working-class  discontent  was  intensified. 


220 


CHAPTER  TEN 

THE  PARLIAMENTARY  LABOUR  PARTY PHYSICAL  BREAK- 
DOWN— ROUND  THE  WORLD 

THE  end  of  the  year  brought  the  opportunity  for 
which  he  and  his  colleagues  had  been  waiting  and 
working.    The  .Government  resigned  in  Decem- 
ber, and  the  Liberals  accepted    office  with  Sir  Henry 
Campbell-Bannerman  as  Prime  Minister.    As  soon  as 
his  Government  was  formed,  he  dissolved  Parliament, 
and  the  long  hoped  for  General  Election  took  place. 

Concerning  the  new  Government  and  its  personnel, 
Hardie  had  some  observations  to  make  which,  in  view 
of  subsequent  history,  are  not  without  interest.  Of  the 
Prime  Minister,  he  said,  "The  most  lasting  impression 
I  have  of  him  is  when  as  chairman  of  the  Unemployed 
Committee  of  1893,  he  so  engineered  the  proceedings  as 
to  get  the  winter  through  without  doing  anything  for 
the  starving  out-of-works.  It  may  be,  however,  that  he 
has  repented  of  the  apparent  callousness  which  the 
exigencies  of  party  forced  upon  him  in  those  days,  and 
is  prepared  to  atone  for  the  past  by  his  good  deeds  in 
the  future."  From  the  democratic  point  of  view  the 
most  interesting  appointment  was  that  of  John  Burns 
to  the  Local  Government  Board.  "In  his  early  Socialist 
days,"  said  Hardie,  "he  fought  magnificently,  but  he  has 
not  shown  himself  the  man  to  lead  a  forlorn  hope  or  to 
stand  alone  in  a  crisis.  He  is  a  hard  worker,  and  that 
fact  alone  will  create  a  stir  in  his  department  and  may 
lead  to  surprising  results."  Hardie  coupled  Burns  with 

221 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Morley  in    this  sarcastically  back-handed  way  :  "The 
most  prominent  Radical  in  the  Cabinet  whose  distrust 
of  the  people  is  only  equalled  by  that  of  John  Burns. 
In  temperament  no  two  men  are  wider  apart  than  our 
brace  of  'Honest  Johns/     Morley  is  philosophic,  timid 
and  pedantic;  Burns  headstrong,  impulsive  and  dash- 
ing,   but  they  are   one   in    their   lack  of   faith   in   the 
democracy."  On  the  other  hand,  of  Sir  Robert  Reid,  the 
new  Lord  Chancellor  with  the  title  of  Lord  Loreburn, 
he  declared,  "There  is  no  man  in  politics  with  a  cleaner 
record   or   a   more   democratic    spirit. "      High    praise 
indeed  coming  from  Keir  Hardie.  f  Lloyd  George,  also 
making  his  first  entrance  into  officialdom,  he  described 
as  "a    politician  with    no  settled  convictions    on  social 
questions.    He  will  go  all  the  length  his  party  goes,  but 
hitherto  social  questions  have  lain  outside  the  sphere  of 
his  orbit.   As  a  hard-working  lawyer  and  rising  politician 
he  has  enough  to  do  to   keep  abreast  of    the  fighting 
party  line  without  wandering  into  the  by-ways  of  social 
reform.'^/  Asquith  and  Haldane  he  characterised  as 
"cold-blooded  reactionaries  of  the  most  dangerous  type. 
With  professions  of  Liberalism  on  their  lips,  they  are 
despots  at  hearts,  and  as  they  are  the  strong  men  of  the 
Cabinet  and  are  upholders  of  the  Roseberian  interpre- 
tation of  Liberalism,  they  can  be  reckoned  upon  to  see 
that  this  view  is  well  upheld  in  the  inner  councils  of  the 
Cabinet."    Lord  Portsmouth  he  summed  up  as  "a  Tory 
who   has  left  his  party  on  the  JFree   Trade  question." 
Lord  Crewe  was  "a  recent   convert   from   Unionism," 
whilst  "a  big  majority  of  the  others  are  Unionists  in  all 
but  name.      They  are  all  representatives  of  the  landed 
interests  and  they  certainly  have  not  joined  the  Govern- 
ment to  press  forward  either  land  nationalisation  or  the 
taxation  of  land  values."       "  Labour  folks,"  he  said, 
"will  note  without  enthusiasm  that  there  are  seventeen 

222 


THE   LABOUR   PARTY 

land-owning  peers,  and  sixteen  place-hunting  lawyers 
in  the  new  Government."  He  had  no  illusions.  He  was 
building  no  high  hopes  for  democracy  on  the  advent 
of  the  new  Liberal  Government.  His  hopes  lay  in  an 
Independent  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  which  would 
act  as  a  spur  to  the  Government  and  fight  it  when  neces- 
sary, and  for  the  realisation  of  this  hope  he  now  plunged 
himself  body  and  soul  into  the  general  election  turmoil. 
The  L.R.C.  had  fifty- two  candidates,  ten  of  whom 
were  I.L.P.  nominees,  while  thirty-two  of  the  others 
nominated  by  trade  unions  were  members  of  the  Party. 
Hardie  took  part  personally  in  nearly  every  one  of  these 
contests,  and  during  the  next  three  weeks  he  was 
working  literally  morning,  noon  and  night,  in  the 
roughest  of  weather,  travelling  backwards  and  forwards 
from  one  end  of  the  country  to  the  other,  speaking  some- 
times in  crowded  halls  and  stifling  schoolrooms,  some- 
times in  the  open  air,  and  beyond  doubt  contributing 
immensely  to  the  success  which  the  final  results  revealed. 
He  went  everywhere  but  into  his  own  constituency. 
There  was  some  doubt  as  to  whether  he  would  be 
opposed,  and  as  he  regarded  the  general  success  of  the 
Labour  movement  as  being  of  more  importance  than  his 
own  individual  success,  he  could  not  allow  himself  to  be 
tied  up  in  Merthyr  waiting  for  an  opposition  which  was 
problematical.  Besides,  he  had  reason  to  believe  that  his 
position  in  Merthyr  was  now  so  secure  that  no  eleventh- 
hour  opposition  could  possibly  endanger  it,  a  belief 
justified  by  the  result,  though  some  of  his  local  supporters 
were  not  so  confident,  and  were,  indeed,  considerably 
alarmed  by  the  nomination  of  a  shipowning  Liberal 
named  Radcliffe,  whose  candidature  in  the  absence  of 
Hardie,  semed  to  be  making  rapid  progress.  As  at  pre- 
vious elections,  however,  the  local  stalwarts,  Francis, 
Davies,  Morris,  Barr — an  Ayrshire  man  settled  in 

223 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Merthyr — Stanton,  Stonelake  of  Aberdare,  and  a  host  of 
others  poured  into  the  constituency,  fought  the  campaign 
with  vigour  and  enthusiasm,  and  Hardie's  arrival  on  the 
scene,  worn  and  exhausted,  just  two  days  before  the 
polling,  and  the  inspiration  of  victories  in  the  country 
finished  their  efforts.  The  election  figures  were  : — 

Thomas  (Liberal)       ...     13,971 

Hardie  10,187 

Radcliffe  (Liberal)      ...       7,776 

Majority  for  Hardie  ...       2,411 

It  was  the  crowning  glory  of  a  great  campaign.  For 
Hardie  it  was  even  more  than  that.  It  was  the  realisa- 
tion of  all  those  hopes  which  had  sustained  him  through 
long  years  of  toil  and  troubles.  A  Labour  Party,  twenty- 
nine  strong,  entered  Parliament  as  the  result  of  this 
election,  and  thus  another  stage  in  his  life-work  had  been 
reached. 

He  was  well  pleased,  of  course,  but  not  unduly  elated. 
The  first  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  had  been  returned, 
but  it  had  yet  to  be  tried,  and  he  knew  well  that  its  mem- 
bership comprised  some  men  who,  though  their  sincerity 
might  not  be  questioned,  were  restricted  in  their  political 
outlook  by  their  trade  union  training  and  environment, 
and  in  some  cases  by  life-long  association  with  party  Lib- 
eralism; they  might  be  amenable  to  influences  against 
which  he  had  been  impervious.  Better  than  any  of  them 
he  knew  the  temptations  which  would  beset  them.  His 
greatest  satisfaction  was  derived  from  the  fact  that 
amongst  the  men  returned  were  MacDonald,  Snowden, 
and  Jowett,  all  of  them  by  majorities  which  seemed  to 
ensure  their  permanent  presence  in  Parliament.  Often 
and  often,  in  private  conversation  with  comrades  through- 
out the  country,  he  had  anticipated  the  return  of  these 

224 


THE    LABOUR   PARTY 

colleagues,  and  had  extolled  the  special  qualities  which 
would  enable  them  to  make  their  mark  in  Parliament, 
and  confound  the  enemies  of  Labour.  With  such  men 
as  these  he  felt  assured  that  whatever  might  be  the  ebb 
and  flow  of  loyalty  inside  or  outside  of  the  House,  an 
Independent  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  would  be 
maintained.  He  was  now  in  the  fiftieth  year  of  his  life, 
the  greater  part  of  which  had  been  devoted  to  the  uplift- 
ing of  his  class.  The  presence  of  that  class  now  in  Par- 
liament as  an  organised  force  was  the  proof  that  his  life 
had  not  been  without  some  achievement.  Whatever  the 
future  might  hold  in  store  for  him,  the  past  had  been 
worth  while. 

In  the  interval  between  the  election  and  the  assembling 
of  Parliament,  Hardie  spent  a  week  in  Ireland  along  with 
George  N.  Barnes,  who  was  also  one  of  the  victors  in  the 
recent  contest,  having  signally  defeated  Mr.  Bonar  Law 
at  Blackfriars,  Glasgow.  The  Irish  visit  was  meant  as 
a  holiday,  but,  like  most  of  Hardie's  holidays,  it  involved 
a  lot  of  what  other  politicians  would  call  work.  They 
visited  the  Rock  of  Cashel  and  Killarney  and  some  of 
the  natural  and  architectural  beauties  of  Ireland,  but  they 
also  had  public  receptions  and  made  speeches  at  meet- 
ings arranged  impromptu  by  the  Nationalist  M.P.s.,  who 
hailed  as  allies  the  new  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  and 
were  sincerely  anxious  to  honour  Hardie  for  his  own  sake. 
They  also  investigated,  as  far  as  possible,  the  social  con- 
ditions of  the  districts  through  which  they  passed.  Hardie 
was  loud  in  his  praise  of  the  operations  of  the  Congested 
Districts'  Board,  which  he  declared  to  be,  "in  fact,  the 
most  sensible  institution  I  have  ever  known  to  be  set  up 
by  law,  and,  with  adaptations  to  meet  differing  conditions, 
forms  the  model  upon  which  I  should  like  to  see  an 
Unemployment  Committee  constituted.'' 

Very  remarkable  are  his  observations  on  the  Sinn  Fein 

225 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

movement,  at  a  time  when  its  significance  was  realised 
by  few  people  in  this  country,  much  less  the  proportions 
to  which  it  would  grow.  "It  appears  to  be,"  he  said, 
"Fenianism  adapted  to  modern  conditions.  It  is  anti- 
political  and  anti-English.  Its  supporters  tell  you  that 
the  people  are  being  ruined  by  being  taught  to  look  to 
the  English  Government  for  reforms;  that  instead  of 
developing  a  dependence  upon  the  English  Government 
for  reforms  and  waiting  upon  English  capital  to  develop 
Irish  industries,  the  Irish  people  should  set  about  doing 
things  for  themselves.  Up  to  a  certain  point  they  are 
individualists  of  a  very  pronounced  type,  but,  unlike 
the  old  Manchester  school  of  Radical  economists,  they 
have  no  fear  of  State  action,  except  in  so  far  as  it  tends 
to  undermine  the  spirit  of  the  people.  I  speak  with  all 
reserve  as  to  the  present  strength  of  the  movement,  but 
Mr.  Barnes  and  I,  from  what  we  saw  and  heard,  formed 
the  opinion  that  the  Sinn  Fein  movement  was  bound  to 
play  an  important  part  in  the  development  of  Ireland." 
That  prediction  has  certainly  been  fulfilled. 

With  the  entrance  of  the  Labour  Party  into  the  House 
of  Commons,  Hardie's  Parliamentary  career  assumes  a 
new  phase.  His  personality  becomes  to  a  certain  extent, 
though  never  completely,  merged  in  the  Party  organisa- 
tion. There  still  remained  questions,  as  we  shall  see, 
upon  which  he  would  find  it  necessary  to  take  a  line  of 
his  own,  but  on  the  main  purpose,  that  of  developing 
and  maintaining  a  definite  and  distinct  Labour  policy, 
he  was  to  be  subject  to  the  will  of  the  majority.  This 
was  a  condition  of  things  very  welcome  to  him.  It  had 
always  been  irksome  to  him  to  have  to  take  action  in 
any  sudden  political  emergency  without  a  body  of  col- 
leagues with  whom  to  consult.  In  the  last  year  of  the 
previous  Parliament,  it  is  true,  the  co-operation  of  Hen- 
derson, Crooks  and  Shackleton  had  somewhat  lessened 

226 


THE    LABOUR   PARTY 

his  burden  of  personal  responsibility,  but  even  that  was 
vastly  different  from  having  a  well-disciplined  Party  in 
the  House  with  an  assurance  of  support  outside. 

Naturally,  he  was  appointed  chairman  of  the  new 
Party,  which  carried  with  it  leadership  in  the  House. 
There  were  other  aspirants  for  the  position,  but  a  sense 
of  the  fitness  of  things  prevailed,  and  the  honour  and  duty 
of  leading  the  first  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  fell, 
after  a  second  ballot,  to  the  man  who,  more  than  any 
other,  had  made  such  a  Party  possible. 
|  The  achievements  of  the  Party  during  the  next  few 
years  need  not  be  detailed  here.  The  passing  of  the 
Trade  Disputes  Act;  the  final  and  definite  legalising 
of  the  right  of  combination;  the  struggle  for  the  feeding 
of  school  children,  resulting,  at  least,  in  the  feeding  of 
those  who  were  necessitous ;  the  determined  and  contin- 
uous pressing  for  the  right  to  work,  ultimately  compel- 
ling the  Liberal  Party  to  look  for  a  way  out  through 
Unemployment  Insurance;  the  forcing  of  Old  Age  Pen- 
sions— these  and  many  other  seemingly  commonplace 
achievements,  yet  all  tending  to  raise  the  status  of  the 
workers  and  increase  their  sense  of  self-respect  and  of 
power  as  a  class,  are  recorded  jn  various  ways  in  the 
annals  of  the  Labour  movement.  ,They  are  part  of  the 
history  of  the  nation  and  are  to  a  considerable  extent 
embodied  in  its  institutions  and  in  the  daily  life  of  the 
people.  This  was  the  kind  of  work  that  was  naturally 
expected 'from  the  new  Labour  Party.  Readers  of  this 
memoir  do  not  want  recapitulation  of  Har3ie's  share 
in  that  work. 

But  it  must  not  be  assumed  that  either  he  or  the 
other  leaders  of  the  I.L.P.  allowed  their  conceptions  of 
political  activity  to  be  limited  by  the  immediate  struggle 
for  these  tentative  though  essential  measures  of  reform. 
They  were  Socialists,  representing  a  Socialist  organisa- 

227 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

tion,  and  to  them  a  true  Labour  Party  must  have  an 
international  outlook  and  an  international  policy  in  clear 
contradistinction  to  the  Imperialist  policy  of  the  two 
capitalist  parties. 

This  wider  outlook  found  significant  expression  in  a 
resolution  passed  at  the  instance  of  the  I.L.P.  by  the 
Labour  Party  Conference  held  in  London  immediately 
following  this  famous  General  Election.  This  was  a 
v  resolution  expressly  approving  the  better  feeling  between 
Britain  and  France,  desiring  its  extension  to  the  German 
people,  and  declaring  for  a  general  international  under- 
standing that  would  lead  to  disarmament.  /Could  it  then 
have  been  possible  to  have  introduced  the  spirit  of  this 
resolution  into  British  international  policy,  there  would 
have  been  no  European  War  in  1914.  Already  the 
sinister  implications  of  the  Entente  Cordiale,  involving 
as  it  did  an  alliance  not  only  with  Republican  France, 
but  with  Czarist  Russia,  and  the  division  of  Europe  into 
two  hostile  camps,  were  troubling  the  minds  of  thought- 
ful, peace-loving  people,  who  could  not  help  connecting 
the  new  militarist  plans  of  the  War  Office  with  the  schem- 
ings  of  the  .diplomatists. 

Hardie's  distrust  of  the  Liberal  Imperialist  group  as 
a  reactionary  influence  within  the  Government  has 
already  been  referred  to,  and  from  his  point  of  view 
it  very  soon  found  confirmation.  Mr.  Haldane,  the  War 
Minister,  foreshadowed  the  coming  strife  when  he 
declared  his  intention  to  popularise  the  idea  of  "a  nation 
in  arms/'  and  the  inevitable  development  of  his  schemes 
for  the  creation  of  a  territorial  army,  voluntary  at  first, 
but,  as  Hardie  .declared,  likely  to  become  conscriptive 
in  its  working.  "There  we  have,"  he  said,  analysing 
Haldane's  scheme,  "a  set  of  proposals  which  will  require 
the  most  careful  watching  and  the  most  unflinching 
opposition  from  all  friends  of  peace.  By  force  of  social 

228 


THE    LABOUR   PARTY 

pressure  or  other  form  of  compulsion,  the  youth  of  the 
nation  are  to  be  induced  to  undergo  military  training  as 
volunteers.  Thereafter  they  are  to  be  returned  into  a 
reserve  force  which  is  to  be  available  as  a  supplement 
to  the  regular  army  when  required  for  service  abroad. 
At  a  time  when  continental  nations  are  growing  weary 
of  conscription  and  agitating  for  its  abolition,  we  are 
having  it  introduced  into  this  country  under  the  specious 
disguise  of  broadening  the  basis  of  the  army.  When  it 
was  proposed  to  tax  food,  that  was  described  as  broaden- 
ing the  basis  of  taxation.  Now,  when  an  attempt  is  being 
made  to  popularise  universal  military  service,  it  is  a 
similar  phrase  which  is  used  to  conceal  the  true  meaning 
of  the  proposal.  In  fighting  Protection  we  had  the  aicL 
of  the  Liberal  Party.  Now,  apparently,  it  is  the  same 
Party  which  is  to  be  used  to  foitet  a  thinly-disguised 
form  of  conscription  upon  the  nation." 

Readers  with  war-time  experience  can  now  judge  for 
themselves  whether  this  analysis  of  Haldane's  Army 
Reform  proposals  was  correct  or  not.  The  only  differ- 
ence between  Haldane  and  Lord  Roberts,  Hardie 
declared,  was  that  "the  former,  being  more  of  a  politician, 
carefully  avoids  the  hateful  word  'compel/  but  evidently 
has  imbibed  Lord  Roberts'  ideas  down  to  the  last  dot." 

Qie  combated  strenuously  the  theory  that  the  best  way 
o  prevent  war  was  to  prepare  to  make  war 7]  On  the 
contrary,  he  held  that  "the  means  to  do  ill  deeds  makes 
ill  done,"  and  that  a  nation  in  arms  was  an  aggressively 
warlike  nation,  whose  very  existence  made  the  mainten- 
ance of  international  peace  difficult,  if  not  impossible. 
This  was  more  especially  the  case  if  it  were  a  nation  like 
Great  Britain,  Imperialist  and  Commercialist  in  its 
world  policy.  "Militarism  and  all  that  pertains  to  it  is 
inimical  to  the  cause  of  progress,  the  well-being  of  the 
people,  and  the  development  of  the  race." 

Q  229 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

This  may  almost  be  said  to  have  been  the  keynote  of 
his  appeal  during  the  remainder  of  his  life,  for  even  then, 
to  him  and  to  others,  there  was  discernible  the  cloud  no 
bigger  than  a  man's  hand  that  was  eventually  to  outspread 
and  darken  the  political  skies  and  burst  in  disruptive 
disaster  upon  the  world.  To  avert  this  catastrophe  the 
I.L.P.  devoted  much  of  its  energy  and  resources  during 
the  ensuing  years,  opposing  all  militarist  developments, 
whether  it  was  Haldane's  Territorial  Army  scheme,  or 
the  demands  for  an  increase  of  naval  and  military  arma- 
ments, conducting  anti-militarist  campaigns  right  up  to 
the  eve  of  the  great  tragedy,  and  hoping  always  that  the 
International  Socialist  movement  might  so  increase  in 
strength  as  to  be  able  to  preserve  the  peace  of  the  world. 

Doubtless  Hardie  had  this  thought  uppermost  in  his 
mind  during  his  visit  to  Brussels  the  following  month  as 
a  member  of  the  International  Socialist  Bureau  to  pre- 
pare for  the  next  year's  Congress  at  Stuttgart.  He  had 
with  him  as  his  colleague  on  this  occasion  Mr.  H.  M. 
Hyndman,  of  whom  he  said,  "a  more  charming  and 
agreeable  companion  no  wayfarer  ever  had,"  which 
causes  the  reflection  that  if  these  two  could  have  been 
in  close  companionship  oftener  much  mutual  misunder- 
standing might  have  been  avoided. 

Meantime,  while  the  hidden  hands  of  diplomacy  and 
finance  were  busy  in  European  politics,  and  while  the 
Labour  Party  in  Parliament  was  steadily  finding  its  feet 
and  becoming  a  force  in  the  shaping  of  industrial  legisla- 
tion, the  Women's  Suffrage  movement  was  attracting, 
not  to  say  distracting,  attention  in  the  country.  The 
past  attitude  of  party  leaders  and  politicians  generally, 
the  I.L.P.  always  excepted,  had  been  to  ignore  it  loftily, 
to  assume  that  it  was  a  manufactured  agitation,  the  pro- 
duct of  a  few  enthusiastic  cranks,  and  that  there  was 
really  no  demand  for  the  vote  by  any  numerous  section 

230 


WOMEN'S  AGITATION 

of  women.  The  ethics  of  political  equality  did  not,  of 
course,  trouble  these  status  quo  politicians.  The 
Women's  Social  and  Political  Union  set  itself  out  to 
shatter  this  serene  aloofness,  and  did  so  very  effectually, 
shattering  some  other  things  in  the  process.  At  a  Liberal 
demonstration  in  Manchester  the  previous  year,  at  which 
Mr.  Churchill  was  the  chief  speaker,  a  number  of  suffra- 
gists, incensed  by  the  refusal  of  the  platform  to  answer 
their  questions,  set  up  such  a  din  that  the  police  were 
called  in  to  eject  the  women,  and  a  kind  of  miniature  riot 
took  place.  Miss  Adela  Pankhurst  and  Miss  Annie 
Kenney,  two  young  but  very  vigorous  ladies,  were 
arrested,  but  no  prosecution  followed.  Immediately 
after  the  General  Election,  a  deputation  of  women  sought 
an  interview  with  the  Prime  Minister  at  his  residence 
in  London,  and  on  being  refused  admittance  created  a 
disturbance.  Three  women  were  arrested  on  this  occa- 
sion but  were  also  released  without  a  prosecution.  Thus 
this  phase  of  the  movement  began. 

Hardie  did  not  identify  himself  with  nor  express 
approval  of  these  demonstrations,  but  he  did  what  was 
better.  Being  fortunate  in  the  ballot,  he  made  himself 
sponsor  for  a  resolution  in  Parliament  which,  if  it  had 
been  carried,  and  of  this  there  was  tolerable  certainty, 
would  have  advanced  the  women's  cause  by  several 
years.  The  women  had  been  very  active  during  the 
General  Election,  and  had  pledged  a  majority  of  Mem- 
bers of  the  House  of  Commons  to  support  their  demands. 
Hardie's  resolution  was  designed  to  enable  these 
gentlemen  to  redeem  their  pledges,  and  thereby  secure 
a  majority  vote  which  would  in  effect  have  been  a  man- 
date to  the  Government.  The  resolution  was  as  follows  : 
"That  in  the  opinion  of  this  House  it  is  desirable  that 
sex  should  cease  to  be  a  bar  to  the  exercise  of  the  Parlia- 
mentary Franchise."  Hardie,  knowing  that  time  was 

231 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

valuable,  spoke  briefly  and  persuasively.  It  was  known 
that,  as  usual,  an  attempt  would  be  made  to  talk  the 
resolution  out,  but  precedents  were  clear,  and  the 
Speaker  would  no  doubt  have  given  the  closure.  Some 
suffragists  in  the  Ladies'  Gallery  who  were  not  well 
acquainted  with  procedure,  seeing  the  clock  fingers 
creep  round  to  the  closing  hour,  believed  that  everything 
was  undone,  and  made  a  demonstration.  That  ended  the 
matter  and  defeated  all  hope  of  the  closure.  The  resolu- 
tion was  talked  out,  or  it  might  be  more  accurate  to  say, 
screamed  out.  Hardie  uttered  no  word  of  disapproval  of 
the  demonstration,  and  indeed,  to  some  extent  defended 
the  action  of  the  women,  but  he  would  have  preferred 
that  it  had  not  occurred.  He  believed  that  it  would  have 
been  possible  to  get  the  debate  closured  in  time  for  a 
division,  in  which  case  the  resolution  might  have  been 
carried  by  a  substantial  majority.  Whether  or  not  his 
hopes  would  have  been  realised  can,  of  course,  never 
now  be  determined. 

Thus  ended  the  famous  "grille  scene,"  the  precursor 
of  many  much  more  violent  demonstrations  at  public 
meetings  throughout  the  country,  in  some  of  which 
Hardie  himself  was  destined  to  be  a  sufferer.  So 
indiscriminate  is  fanaticism,  even  in  a  good  cause. 

These  events  happened  in  his  jubilee  year.  In 
response  to  the  suggestion  that  the  occasion  should  be 
signalised  by  some  public  manifestation,  he  character- 
istically advised  that  it  should  take  the  form  of  a 
special  fund  for  organisation.  Having  regard  to  the 
recent  heavy  demands  upon  the  rank  and  file  for  elec- 
tion finance,  this  was  not  at  the  moment  considered 
feasible,  though  it  was  not  lost  sight  of,  as  we  shall  see. 
What  was  decided  upon  was  a  public  reception  and 
presentation.  This  took  place  on  October  24th  in  the 
Memorial  Hall,  London,  which  was  crowded  to  over- 

232 


JUBILEE 

A 

flowing  with  men  and  women  representative  of  every 
phase  and  section  of  the  Labour  and  Socialist  move- 
ment, desirous  of  celebrating,  as  one  Welshman  with  a 
fine  spiritual  perception  put  it,  "Keir  Hardie's  fifty 
years  on  earth."  There  were  telegrams  of  congratula- 
tion from  four  hundred  and  forty-nine  branches  of  the 
I.L.P.  and  also  from  numerous  other  Socialist  and 
Trade  Union  organisations,  besides  messages  of  good- 
will from  many  distinguished  people  outside  the 
Socialist  movement.  As  showing  how  completely  he 
had  lived  down  misunderstanding,  for  the  time,  the 
message  from  the  Social  Democratic  Federation  may 
be  quoted.  "This  Executive  Council  of  the  S.D.F. 
congratulate  Comrade  Keir  Hardie  on  the  attainment 
of  his  fiftieth  birthday,  express  their  admiration  of  his 
independent  Parliamentary  career  and  his  outspoken 
advocacy  of  Socialist  principles  as  the  object  of  the 
working-class  movement,  and  wish  him  many  years  of 
life  in  which  to  carry  on  his  work  for  the  people." 
Hardie  himself  arrived  on  the  scene  late,  for  the 
characteristic  reason  that  he  had  been  in  Poplar  speak- 
ing on  behalf  of  the  Labour  candidates  there. 
Philip  Snowden  presided,  and  Bruce  Glasier  made 
the  presentation,  which  consisted  of  an  inscribed 
gold  watch  with  fob  and  seal,  subscribed  for  by  the 
N.A.C.  and  a  few  intimate  friends,  and  a  gold-mounted 
umbrella  for  Mrs.  Hardie.  Modest  gifts,  but  for  that 
very  reason  precious  to  the  recipients.  Hardie  was  very 
proud  of  his  gifts  for  another  reason,  quite  unknown  to 
the  donors.  "I've  aye  wanted  to  hae  a  gold  watch,"  he 
said  naively  to  the  present  writer,  thus  confessing  to 
an  ambition  that  was  very  common  amongst  douce 
Scots  working  men  in  the  days  when  gold  watches  were 
rare  possessions.  He  did  not  possess  his  treasure  long, 
nor  was  he  able  to  hand  it  on  as  an  heirloom.  At  the  by- 

233 


J.  KEIR  HARDIR 

election  in  Bermondsey  a  few  years  later  the  watch  was 
stolen  and  was  never  recovered. 

Hardie's  fiftieth  year  found  him  at  the  height  of  his 
mental  powers;  clear  of  vision,  resolute  of  purpose, 
practical  and  tolerant  in  the  Council  room,  vigilant  in 
Parliament,  persuasive  and  idealistic  on  the  platform, 
and  with  the  never-resting  pen  of  a  ready  writer.  He 
stood  out  at  the  time,  beyond  all  question,  as  the  greatest 
of  working-class  leaders.  His  physical  appearance  also 
seemed  to  reflect  his  mental  and  spiritual  attributes. 
There  had  grown  upon  him  an  unaffected  dignity  of 
bearing,  which,  with  hair  and  beard  greying  almost  to 
whiteness,  endued  his  personality  with  a  kind  of  vener- 
ableness,  inducing  involuntary  respect  even  from 
strangers.  He  looked  much  older  than  fifty  years, 
except  when  the  light  flashed  from  his  eyes  in  friendly 
laughter  or  in  righteous  anger.  Then  he  looked  much 
younger.  Always,  even  to  his  intimate  friends,  there 
was  something  mystic,  unfathomable,  about  him.  He 
was  at  once  aged  and  youthful,  frankly  open  and 
reticently  reserved.  The  explanation  may  perhaps  be 
found  in  some  reminiscently. introspective  words  written 
by  himself  about  this  time.!  "I  am,"  he  said,  "younger 
in  spirit  at  fifty  than  I  ever  remember  to  have  been.  I 
am  one  of  the  unfortunate  class  who  have  never  known 
what  it  was  to  be  a  child — in  spirit  I  mean.  Even  the 
memories  of  boyhood  and  young  manhood  are  gloomy. 
Under  no  circumstances,  given  freedom  of  choice, 
would  I  live  that  part  of  my  life  over  again.  Not  until 
my  life's  work  found  me,  stripped  me  bare  of  the  past 
and  absorbed  me  into  itself  did  life  take  on  any  real 
meaning  for  me.  Now  I  know  the  main  secret.  He 
v/ho  would  find  his  life  must  lose  it  in  otters.  One 
day  I  may  perhaps  write  a  book  about  this. "..--The  book 
was  never  written,  more's  the  pity.  It  would  most  cer- 

234 


SUFFRAGE    CONTROVERSY 

tainly  have  been  personally  reminiscent  and  biographi- 
cal, and  the  present  writer's  task  would  have  been 
unnecessary. 

In  December  of  this  year  he  had  a  surprise  for  his 
colleagues  of  the  National  Council  which  took  the  shape 
of  an  offer  of  ^2,000  which  had  been  placed  at  his  dis- 
posal and  which  he  desired  should  be  utilised  as  an 
organising  fund  on  condition  that  a  similar  sum  be  raised 
by  the  Party  within  a  month.  The  offer  was,  of  course, 
accepted  and  the  conditions  prescribed  complied  with, 
the  result  being  a  great  revival  of  organising  and  pro- 
paganda activity  throughout  the  whole  of  the  I.L.P. 
movement.  It  was  disclosed  afterwards  that  the  Edin- 
burgh ladies  already  referred  to  had  taken  this  method 
of  showing  their  interest  in  Hardie's  jubilee  celebrations. 

It  may  be  noted  here,  and  will  save  any  further 
reference,  that  these  two  ladies  continued  to  assist  in 
the  same  practical  way  during  the  remainder  of  their 
lives,  and  in  1913,  when  Miss  Jane  Kippen,  who  had 
survived  the  other  sister  by  some  years,  died,  it  was 
found  that  by  her  will,  the  whole  of  her  real  estate, 
approximately  £10,000,  had  been  left  jointly  to  Keir 
Hardie  and  John  Redmond  as  trustees  for  the  I.L.P. 
and  the  Irish  Nationalist  Party  respectively. 

The  Labour  Party — this  was  the  title  now  adopted  by 
the  Labour  Representation  Committee — held  its  annual 
Conference  in  January,  1907,  at  Belfast.  Both  at  this 
Conference,  and  at  the  Conference  of  the  I.L.P.  at 
Derby  in  April,  the  Woman's  Suffrage  question  caused 
serious  trouble,  and.  in  the  first  case,  very  nearly  created 
a  breach  between  Hardie  and  the  organisation  which  he 
had  brought  into  existence.  At  Belfast,  the  trouble 
arose  out  of  an  amendment  to  a  resolution  urging  "the 
immediate  extension  of  the  rights  of  suffrage  and  of 
election  of  women  on  the  same  conditions  as  men." 

235 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

The  amendment,  which  was  carried  by  605,000  to 
268,000,  declared  that  "any  suggested  measure  to 
extend  the  franchise  on  a  property  qualification  to  a 
section  only,  is  a  retrograde  step  and  should  be  opposed. ' ' 

The  carrying  of  this  amendment  was  tantamount  to 
an  instruction  from  the  conference  to  the  Parliamentary 
Labour  Party  not  to  proceed  with  its  Franchise  Bill 
extending  the  vote  to  women  on  the  same  qualification  as 
at  present  ruled  for  men.  Hardie  was  chairman  and 
leader  of  the  Parliamentary  Party.  He  was,  moreover, 
a  firm  believer  in  the  policy  involved  in  the  limited  Bill, 
a  policy  which  he  had  supported  alike  in  the  House,  on 
the  platform,  and  in  the  press,  and  he  was  keenly 
disappointed  with  the  conference  vote,  though  he  was 
well  aware  that  the  policy  of  the  militant  women  them- 
selves had  helped  to  bring  about  that  result  by  pre- 
judicing the  delegates  against  them. 

Only  a  few  days  before  there  had  appeared  in  the 
press  what  purported  to  be  an  official  statement  from  the 
W.S.P.U.  ostentatiously  flouting  the  Labour  Party,  and 
declaring  that :  "No  distinction  is  made  between  the 
Unionist  and  the  Labour  Parties."  There  was  there- 
fore some  ground  for  resentment  on  the  part  of  the 
Conference,  and  this  doubtless  expressed  itself  in  the 
adverse  vote.  Hardie  deplored  these  manifestations 
on  the  part  of  the  women,  which  he  ascribed  "to  excess 
of  zeal,"  but  they  did  not  shake  his  adherence  to  the 
policy  of  the  immediate  political  equalisation  of  the  sexes. 
"We  have  to  learn  to  distinguish  between  a  great  prin- 
ciple and  its  advocates,"  he  said,  and  the  adverse  vote 
of  the  Conference  came  to  him  as  a  kind  of  challenge 
which  he  felt  bound  to  meet  at  once,  and  before  the 
Conference  closed.  In  the  course  of  moving  a  vote  of 
thanks  to  the  Belfast  Trades  Council  and  the  press,  he 
asked  leave  to  make  a  statement  on  the  matter.  The 

236 


SUFFRAGE   CONTROVERSY 

statement  will  bear  recording  here,  alike  for  its  historical 
and  its  biographical  interest.  It  is  contributory  to  our 
general  estimate  of  the  character  of  the  man  who 
made  it. 

"Twenty-five  years  ago  this  year,"  he  said,  "I  cut 
myself  adrift  from  every  relationship,  political  and 
otherwise,  in  order  to  assist  in  building  up  a  working- 
class  party.  I  had  thought  the  days  of  my  pioneering 
were  over.  Of  late,  I  have  felt  with  increasing  intensity 
the  injustices  that  have  been  inflicted  on  women  by  the 
present  political  laws.  The  intimation  I  wish  to  make 
to  the  Conference  and  friends  is  that,  if  the  motion  they 
carried  this  morning  was  intended  to  limit  the  action  of 
the  Party  in  the  House  of  Commons,  I  shall  have  to 
seriously  consider  whether  I  shall  remain  a  member  of 
the  Parliamentary  Party.  I  say  this  with  great  respect 
and  feeling.  The  party  is  largely  my  own  child,  and 
I  could  not  sever  myself  lightly  from  what  has  been  my 
life-work.  But  I  cannot  be  untrue  to  my  principles, 
and  I  would  have  to  be  so,  were  I  not  to  do  my  utmost 
to  remove  the  stigma  upon  the  women,  mothers  and 
sisters,  of  being  accounted  unfit  for  political  citizenship." 

This  statement,  which  was  quite  unexpected,  created 
something  like  consternation  among  the  delegates,  and 
for  the  first  time  in  its  history,  the  Labour  Party  Con- 
ference ended  in  a  note  of  depression. 

Though  there  was  much  resentment  against  Hardie 
within  the  Labour  Party  for  the  line  he  had  taken,  which 
showed  itself  when  he  stood  again  for  the  chair,  and 
the  opposition  continued  to  smoulder,  needless  to  say, 
the  separation  did  not  take  place.  The  decision  of  the 
Conference,  of  course,  could  not  be  set  aside.  What 
was  decided  upon,  mainly  on  the  suggestion  of  Arthur 
Henderson,  was  that  individual  members  of  the  Party 
were  left  free  to  support  a  Woman's  Franchise  Bill 

237 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

should  it  be  introduced.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  such  a 
measure  was  introduced  during  the  session  by  Mr. 
Dickinson,  a  Liberal  member,  and  supported  in  a 
speech  by  Hardie,  and  by  the  votes  of  most  of  the 
Labour  Members. 

The  trouble  at  the  I.L.P.  Conference  arose  in  a 
different  way,  though  it  was  essentially  the  same  trouble. 
Unlike  the  Labour  Party,  the  I.L.P.  was  nearly 
unanimous  in  its  support  of  the  limited  Bill,  but  when 
in  addition  to  that  support,  the  Standing  Orders  Commit- 
tee accepted  an  emergency  resolution,  congratulating 
the  suffragists  in  prison,  there  was  a  strong  protest 
against  distinguishing  preferentially  these  women  from 
the  others  who  were  working  loyally  for  the  general 
objects  of  the  Party.  Amongst  the  most  emphatic  of 
the  protesters  were  Margaret  MacDonald,  the  wife  of 
the  chairman,  and  J.  Bruce  Glasier,  whose  remarks 
illustrate  vividly  the  intensity  of  feeling  that  was  being 
evoked  within  the  Party  by  the  tactics  of  the  W.S.P.U. 
"This  telegram,"  he  declared,  "virtually  committed  the 
Party  to  the  policy  of  the  Women's  Political  Union.  It 
expresses  warm  sympathy  with  a  special  kind  of  martyr- 
dom. He  wished,  like  Mrs.  MacDonald,  to  express 
sympathy  with  and  stand  up  for  our  own  women  who 
had  stuck  faithfully  to  the  Party.  He  was  all  for  the 
women's  cause,  but  not  for  the  Women's  Political 
Union."  Hardie,  who  was  mainly  responsible  for  the 
idea  of  sending  the  telegram,  and  also  for  its  wording, 
appealed  for  a  unanimous  vote,  on  the  ground  that  as 
a  large  proportion  of  the  women  who  were  coming  out  of 
prison  that  week  were  members  of  the  Party,  it  would 
be  a  graceful  act  to  send  the  telegram,  and  that  it  "should 
go  forth  wholeheartedly,  without  expressing  an  opinion 
on  the  question  of  tactics,  that  we  have  an  appreciation 
for  those  who  have  the  courage  to  go  to  prison  in  sup- 

238 


SUFFRAGE   CONTROVERSY 

port  of  what  they  believe  to  be  right."  Notwithstanding 
this  appeal,  the  motion  to  refer  the  telegram  back  to 
the  Standing  Orders  Committee  was  only  defeated  by 
eight  votes,  there  being  188  in  its  favour  and  180  against, 
a  striking  indication  of  how  evenly  the  Conference  was 
divided  on  the  matter.  Even  m  the  subsequent  vote 
as  to  whether  the  telegram  should  be  sent,  there  were 
60  against  it.  The  message  was  sent,  but  certainly 
not  wholeheartedly. 

The  position  must  be  made  clear.  The  I.L.P.  was 
in  favour  of  Women's  Suffrage.  It  had  always  been. 
It  was  in  favour  also  of  the  W.S.P.U.  method  of  obtain- 
ing the  vote,  namely,  by  equalising  the  franchise  for  the 
sexes,  whatever  the  basis  of  qualification  might  be.  But 
it  was  not  inclmed  to  subordinate  every  other  social 
question  to  the  advancement  of  the  women's  movement, 
nor  to  allow  itself  to  be  committed  to  methods  of  agita- 
tion upon  which  it  had  never  been  consulted,  nor,  in 
electioneering  matters,  to  be  placed  in  the  same  category 
with  other  political  parties  who  had  always  opposed  the 
women's  claim. 

Hardie  evidently  did  not  think  these  dangers  were 
involved  in  the  sending  of  the  sympathetic  telegram; 
or  perhaps  he  thought  the  Party  was  big  enough  to  take 
the  risk.  The  fact  that  in  this  matter  he  was  at  variance 
with  Glasier  and  MacDonald  and  some  of  the  other 
leaders  was  very  disquieting  to  many  of  the  members 
of  the  Party  and  a  source  of  satisfaction  to  its  enemies. 
Evidently  the  "Woman  Question"  had  disintegrating 
potentialities,  which,  if  these  leaders  had  been  small- 
minded  men,  might  have  worked  very  great  mischief  to 
the  movement.  To  all  concerned  it  brought  a  good  deal 
of  pain,  accentuated  in  Hardie's  case  by  the  fact  that 
he  was  conscious  of  the  symptoms  of  a  recurrence  of 
that  physical  trouble  from  which,  since  the  operation, 

239 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

he  had  never  been  wholly  free,  and  which  a  month  later 
resulted  in  his  serious  breakdown. 

Amidst  all  these  activities  Hardie  had  found  time  to 
write  a  book  for  the  "Labour  Ideal  Series"  projected  by 
George  Allen,  and  published  about  this  time.  The  title 
of  the  book,  "From  Serfdom  to  Socialism,"  indicates 
its  subject  and  scope.  Despite  the  author's  depreciatory 
foreword,  it  is  one  of  the  most  compact  and  vivid  state- 
ments of  the  case  for  Socialism  that  has  ever  been 
written,  comprising  in  some  four  thousand  words  a 
survey  alike  of  the  philosophic  and  the  economic 
developments  towards  the  Socialist  State,  not  as  a 
finality  but  as  the  natural  and  necessary  environment 
for  a  future  Communist  society.  "Mankind  when  left 
free  has  always  and  in  all  parts  of  the  world  naturally 
turned  to  Communism.  That  it  will  do  so  again  is  the 
most  likely  forecast  that  can  be  made,  and  the  great 
industrial  organisations,  the  Co-operative  movement, 
the  Socialist  organisations  and  the  Labour  Party  are 
each  and  all  developing  the  feeling  of  solidarity  and  of 
mutual  aid  which  will  make  the  inauguration  of  Com- 
munism a  comparatively  easy  task  as  the  natural 
successor  to  State  Socialism." 

The  charm  of  the  book  lies  in  its  lucidity  and  in  the 
complete  avoidance  of  that  technical  and  turgid  termin- 
ology which  looks  scientific,  but,  for  the  ordinary  reader, 
is  only  befogging;  and  it  was  for  the  ordinary  reader 
that  the  book  was  written. 

A  short  extract  from  the  chapter  on  "Socialism"  will 
give  some  idea  of  its  arguments  and  method.  "The 
State  is  what  the  people  make  it.  Its  institutions  are 
necessarily  shaped  to  further  and  protect  the  interests 
of  the  dominant  influence.  Whilst  a  landed  nobility 
reigned  supreme,  the  interests  of  that  class  were  the  one 
concern  of  the  State.  Subsequently  with  the  growth  of 

240 


SOCIALISM 

the  commercial  and  trading  class,  which,  when  it  became 
strong  enough,  insisted  on  sharing  the  power  of  the 
State  with  the  landed  aristocracy,  many  of  the  old  laws 
passed  by  the  landlords  in  restraint  of  trade  were  modi- 
fied. Now  that  the  working  class  is  the  dominant  power, 
politically  at  least,  it  logically  and  inevitably  follows 
that  that  class  will  also  endeavour  so  to  influence  the 
State  as  to  make  it  protect  its  interests.  As  the  political 
education  of  the  workers  progresses,  and  they  begin 
to  realise  what  are  the  true  functions  of  the  State,  this 
power  will  be  exerted  i'n  an  increasing  degree  in  the 
direction  of  transforming  the  State  from  a  property- 
preserving  to  a  life-preserving  institution.  The  funda- 
mental fact  which  the  working  class  is  beginning  to 
recognise  is  that  property,  or  at  least  its  possession, 
is  power.  This  is  an  axiom  which  admits  of  no  contra- 
diction. I  So  long  as  property,  using  the  term  to  mean 
land  ancf  capital,  is  in  the  hands  of  a  small  class,  the 
rest  of  the  people  are  necessarily  dependent  upon  that 
class.  A  democracy,  therefore,  has  no  option  but  to 
seek  to  transform  those  forms  of  property,  together  with 
the  power  inherent  in  them,  from  private  to  public 
possession.  Opinions  may  differ  as  to  the  methods  to 
be  pursued  in  bringing  about  that  change,  but  concern- 
ing its  necessity  there  are  no  two  opinions  in  the 
working-class  movement.  When  land  and  capital  are 
the  common  property  of  all  the  people,  class  distinctions, 
as  we  know  them,  will  disappear.  The  mind  will  then 
be  the  standard  by  which  a  r  man's  place  among  his 
fellows  will  be  determined. '^J 

The  book  had  a  wide  circulation.  It  was  essentially 
a  propagandist  document  and  ought  again  to  be  utilised 
for  that  purpose. 

A  reference  made  by  Hardie  at  this  time  to  the  Irish 
question  should  be  here  noted.  It  is  not  inappropriate 

241 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

to  the  present  situation.  It  was  made  in  answer  to  a 
statement  by  the  Rev.  R.  J.  Campbell,  who  was  at  this 
period  making  approaches  to  Labour,  and  who,  in  an 
article  on  "The  Labour  Movement  and  Religion/'  had 
declared  that,  as  an  Ulsterman  by  origin,  he  had  "an 
objection  to  handing  the  whole  of  Ireland  over  to  the 
Roman  Catholic  majority  without  proper  safeguards." 
"I  often  wonder,"  wrote  Hardie,  "why  it  is  that  Ulster- 
men  oppose  Home  Rule  for  the  land  of  their  birth.  If 
there  is  one  fact  in  the  future  more  certain  than  another, 
it  is  that  in  an  Irish  Parliament  Ulstermen  would  wield 
influence  greater  than  any  of  them  have  ever  dreamed  of 
hitherto.  They  are  at  present  cut  off  from  their  fellow 
Irishmen  because  they  hold  themselves  as  a  sect  apart, 
and  are,  in  consequence,  powerless  to  influence  their 
country's  development.  One  session  in  the  House  of 
Commons  would  cure  Mr.  Campbell  of  the  last  rem- 
nants of  the  old  prejudice  against  his  fellow-countrymen 
which  he  probably  drank  in  with  his  mother's  milk 
and  which  still  clings  to  him."  Hardie's  diagnosis  of 
the  individual  Ulsterman's  prejudice  was  probably 
correct,  though  his  proposed  cure  had  no  guarantee  in 
actual  fact.  There  are  Ulstermen  who  have  passed 
many  sessions  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  have 
become  all  the  more  bigoted.  It  is  to  be  feared  that  the 
Ulsterman  does  not  want  to  be  cured  of  his  prejudice 
and  shrinks  from  the  Home  Rule  experiment  for  that 
very  reason. 

Mr.  Campbell  shortly  afterwards  affirmed  his  belief 
in  Socialism  and  joined  the  I.L.P.  mainly  as  the  result 
of  discussions  with  Hardie.  After  a  few  years,  how- 
ever, he  slipped  out,  and  has  not  been  heard  of  politi- 
cally since. 

In  February  of  this  year,  Hardie  had  the  experience 
of  being  "ragged"  at  Cambridge,  whither  he  had  gone 

242 


THE   LABOUR   PARTY 

to  address  a  meeting  at  the  invitation  of  student  and 
working-class  Socialists.  He  went  through  the  ordeal 
without  coming  to  any  harm,  thanks  to  well-organised 
protection  on  the  part  of  the  local  sympathisers,  who 
took  the  brunt  of  the  physical  abuse  meant  for  the 
plebeian  agitator.  A  contemporary  press  comment  may 
be  quoted,  especially  as  it  supplies  contrasting  pictures 
of  Hardie's  experience  as  a  propagandist  and  social 
worker. 

"On  Saturday  night  last,  Keir  Hardie  was  hooted 
and  mobbed  by  the  students  at  Cambridge  University. 
There  is  much  varied  experience  crammed  into  the 
working  day  of  the  Socialist  agitator.  At  one  o'clock 
in  the  morning  of  the  same  day  Keir  Hardie  was  present 
at  quite  a  different  function  from  the  Cambridge  one. 
He  was  with  a  few  companions  on  the  Thames  Embank- 
ment, a  looker-on  at  the  dispensing  of  charity  to  some 
of  London's  destitute  waifs  by  the  Salvation  Army 
officials.  I  know  not  what  other  experience  filled  in  Mr. 
Hardie's  day  between  the  Thames  Embankment  and 
Cambridge  University,  but  in  the  beginning  and  ending 
of  it  there  was  surely  contrast  enough.  The  bottom  dog 
at  the  one  end  and  the  top-cur  at  the  other;  poverty 
and  ignorance  on  the  Embankment;  riches  and  ignor- 
ance at  Cambridge.  The  results  of  our  social  system 
epitomised  in  two  scenes."  And  for  both,  there  was 
deep  sympathy  in  the  heart  of  Keir  Hardie. 

Up  to  the  moment  of  his  breakdown  in  health  he 
was  engrossed  in  work,  and  in  the  very  week  in  which 
he  was  compelled  to  give  up,  he  submitted  a  report  on 
Mr.  Haldane's  Army  Bill  which  he  had  prepared  at  the 
request  of  the  Parliamentary  Labour  Party.  There 
was  never  anything  slipshod  or  superficial  about 
Hardie's  methods,  and  his  analysis  of  the  Army  Bill 
was  exceedingly  searching  and  thorough.  Upon  the 

243 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

basis  of  that  analysis  he  recommended  that  the  Bill 
should  be  opposed,  root  and  branch,  for  the  following 
amongst  other  reasons  : — 

"(a)  Because  it  introduces  militarism  in  our  public 
schools  amongst  boys  at  their  most  impressionable  age 
and  ere  they  have  arrived  at  years  of  discretion. 

"(b)  Because  the  method  by  which  officers  are  to  be 
secured  bars  out  the  working  class  and  creates  an  army 
of  workers  officered  by  rich  men. 

"(c)  Because  it  introduces  the  military  element  into 
industrial  and  civil  relationships  in  a  way  hitherto 
unknown. 

"(d)  Because  we  are  not  convinced  of  the  need  for 
turning  Britain  into  an  armed  camp. 

"Employers  and  workmen,"  said  the  report,  "will 
alike  be  inconvenienced  by  the  provisions  of  the  Bill, 
and  in  the  end  it  will  almost  certainly  lead  to  compulsory 
military  service." 

On  the  lines  indicated  by  this  report,  the  Labour 
Party,  led  mainly  by  MacDonald  and  Snowden,  fought 
the  Bill,  clause  by  clause,  unsuccessfully  of  course,  the 
Tory  Party  being  just  as  militarist  as  the  Liberal 
Government.  Hardie  himself,  to  his  deep  regret,  was 
unable  to  take  part  in  a  fight  into  which  he  would  have 
thrown  every  atom  of  his  energy.  He  had  already, 
during  the  debate  on  the  Army  Estimates,  in  a  search- 
ing and  lofty-toned  speech,  denounced  the  measure  as 
"repugnant  to  all  that  is  best  in  the  moral  and  civil 
traditions  of  the  nation."  The  passing  of  the  Bill  is  a 
matter  of  history,  as  is  also  the  continued  preparation 
for  Armageddon  on  the  part  of  the  rival  nations. 

That  same  week,  Hardie  was  laid  prostrate  and  had 
to  be  removed  to  a  nursing  home  for  examination.  He 
was  loath  to  believe  that  the  attack  was  of  a  kind  that 

244 


ILLNESS 

would  necessitate  anything  more  than  reorganisation 
of  his  work. 

"One  thing  is  certain,"  he  wrote  to  his  friend  Glasier, 
"I  won't  be  able  to  do  any  speaking  this  side  of  Whit 
week.  The  doctors  here  have  been  most  kind.  There 
were  three  of  them  called  in  for  consultation  the  day  I 
was  brought  down,  and  all  three  have  since  visited  me 
in  their  human  rather  than  their  professional  capacity. 
I  don't  know  whether  they  have  been  talking  amongst 
themselves,  but  at  least  they  have  all  harped  upon  the 
one  thing — that  another  attack,  which  they  say  may 
occur  at  any  moment,  would  be  a  very  serious  thing, 
necessitating  an  operation.  They  say  that  by  taking 
things  easy  and,  by  observing  ordinary  gumption  in  the 
matter  of  food,  rest,  and  the  like,  I  may  not  only  go 
on  all  right  for  years,  but  the  trouble  may  heal  up." 

Taking  things  easy  was  the  one  thing  this  man  could 
not  do,  but  on  this  occasion  he  had  no  alternative 
but  to  go  for  a  very  complete  rest,  and,  somewhat 
reluctantly,  he  bowed  to  the  inevitable. 

Writing  in  the  train  on  the  way  home  to  Cumnock, 
he  said,  "I  begin  to  fear  that  the  process  of  restoration 
is  likely  to  be  somewhat  slow.  One  part  of  the  internal 
economy  has  broken  down.  I  have  no  desire  for  food, 
nor  will  anything  solid  lie;  whilst  even  liquids  cause  a 
good  deal  of  uneasiness.  But  I  now  know  this,  and 
have  resolved  accordingly,  and  my  friends  may  rely 
upon  it,  that  I  shall  be  docile  and  tractable.  For  the 
moment  there  is  to  be  no  operation.  Nature  and  more 
gentle  and  soothing  measures  are  to  have  their  chance 
first." 

He  had  got  to  the  point  of  making  good  resolutions 
for  the  future,  and,  recalling  Liebknecht's  reflections  on 
the  effect  which  night  work  and  overwork  had  upon  the 
naturally  strong  constitution  of  Karl  Marx,  he  said,  "I 

R  245 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

shall  try  to  remember  it  after  I  am  well,  but  there  is 
so  much  to  .do,  and  so  few  to  do  it.  I  pray  that  the  end 
may  be  sudden  when  it  comes,  a  lingering  illness  must 
be  dreadful.'5  Thus  chafingly  'did  he  submit  to  the 
ordeal  of  rest. 

Several  weeks'  treatment  at  the  Wemyss  Bay  Hydro- 
pathic brought  him  relief  from  pain  but  did  not  restore 
him  to  vigour,  and  it  became  apparent  that  his  complete 
recovery  would  be  long  delayed.  "The  doctors  tell  me 
that  to  return  to  active  work  now  means  in  all  likelihood 
another  collapse  at  an  early  date.  But  I  cannot  remain 
idle,  nor,  I  feel  certain,  could  I  school  myself  into  taking 
it  easy  at  work.  I  have  never  done  so.  I  can  idle  when 
idling,  but  I  cannot  work  like  an  automaton.  It  was 
the  same  in  the  pits  and  in  the  quarries  in  my  earlier 
days.  I  don't  like  the  prospect  of  another  experience 
like  the  last  few  weeks,  and  I  know  that  the  doctors  are 
right.  A  sick  dispirited  man  is  not  only  of  no  use  in  the 
front  rank  of  our  movement — he  is  apt  to  be  a  nuisance 
to  himself  and  others.  Courage,  initiative,  energy, 
hope,  are  all  needed,  and  these  the  ailing  have  not  got, 
and  cannot  give."  An  unusually  despondent  mood  this, 
for  him,  and  one  that  was  the  surest  proof  that  he  was 
really  very  ill.  And  so,  gradually,  it  was  borne  in  upon 
him  that  he  must  accept  the  advice  given  by  the  doctors 
and  by  many  friends,  and  go  for  a  long  sea  voyage. 

"I  came  here,"  he  wrote  again  from  Wemyss  Bay, 
"to  try  and  get  well,  and  settled  down  to  the  task  as  I 
would  to  the  fighting  of  a  by-election.  Six  and  seven 
times  a  day  I  have  dressed  and  undressed  to  undergo 
treatment  of  one  kind  and  another.  To  leave  the  job 
unfinished  would,  I  feel,  be  neither  fair  to  myself  nor  to 
those  who  look  to  me  for  guidance.  The  sea  voyage 
idea  is  not  quite  settled,  but  I  give  it  thought  as  it  has 
begun  to  shape  itself  in  my  mind." 

246 


ROUND   THE   WORLD 

When  at  last  the  sea  voyage  was  determined  upon, 
the  first  proposal  was  for  a  visit  to  the  Australian 
Colonies  via  Canada,  but  finally  a  voyage  round  the 
world  was  arranged,  and  as  this,  of  course,  included 
India,  that  fact  altered,  as  we  shall  see,  the  whole 
complexion  of  the  enterprise.  He  was  the  more  easily 
reconciled  to  the  prospect  of  a  long  absence  from  home 
by  the  knowledge  that  he  was  leaving  the  movement 
healthier  than  it  had  ever  been,  both  in  Parliament  and 
in  the  country.  His  friend,  Pete  Curran,  had  just  won 
a  signal  by-election  victory  at  Jarrow,  and  Victor  Gray- 
son  was  starting  out  to  contest  Colne  Valley  with  high 
hopes  of  success.  In  the  House,  the  Labour  Party  was 
holding  steadfastly  together,  and  its  leading  men  earn- 
ing distinction  alike  as  practical  legislators  and  as 
opponents  and  critics  of  the  Government.  It  should  be 
noted  here  that  MacDonald  was  at  this  time  vigorously 
besetting  the  Government  with  demands  for  informa- 
tion regarding  the  nature  of  the  agreements  being 
entered  into  with  Russia,  which,  if  it  had  been  given 
and  so  made  public,  might  have  changed  the  whole 
course  of  future  diplomacy.  It  was  certainly  through 
no  lack  of  vigilance  on  the  part  of  the  Labour  Party  that 
the  nation  became  involved  in  international  entangle- 
ments from  which  it  could  not  get  free  without  going  to 
war,  and  which  created  war  conditions  in  the  whole  of 
Europe. 

Before  sailing,  Hardie  wrote  one  article  on  the 
political  situation,  in  which  he  scathingly  indicted  the 
Government  for  shelving  all  its  social  legislation  to 
make  room  for  Haldane's  Territorial  Army  Bill. 
"Everything  else  had  to  stand  aside  for  this  conscription  - 
made-easy  proposal/'  rendered  all  the  more  ominous 
by  the  fact  that  the  Government  "was  making  treaties 
and  bargains  with  Russia,  whilst  the  hands  and  garments 

247 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

of  its  rulers  drip  with  the  blood  of  the  victims  who  are 
daily  being  done  to  death  for  demanding  for  the 
Russian  people  a  say  in  the  government  of  their 
country/' 

He  sailed  from  Liverpool  on  July  I2th,  having  first 
to  undergo  the  ordeal  of  big  send-off  demonstrations  in 
Glasgow,  Manchester  and  Liverpool.  In  an  "Au 
Revoir''  message  to  the  "Leader/'  he  outlined  his  pro- 
spective journeyings  as  follows  :  "In  Canada  and  South 
Africa,  Australia  and  New  Zealand  I  hope  to  meet 
again  friends  of  the  long  ago,  and  to  learn  how  our 
movement  progresses.  Japan  and  China  will  be  touched 
in  passing,  that,  and  little  more.  We  want  all  the 
cohesion  possible  in  our  great  world-wide  movement, 
and  even  a  handshake  in  passing  may  not  be  without  its 
value  in  bringing  the  forces  of  Labour  in  closer  touch. 
India  was  an  afterthought.  At  present  a  lying  press 
campaign  is  being  waged  to  bias  the  people  of  this 
country  against  the  nations  of  that  far-off  land  and  to 
make  it  difficult  for  the  Government  to  do  anything  to 
break  down  the  official  caste  under  which  we  hold  them 
in  the  bondage  of  subjection.  By  seeing  and  hearing 
on  the  spot  what  the  actual  facts  are,  I  may,  on  my 
return,  be  able  to  let  in  a  little  light  upon  the  dark 
places  of  Indian  government." 

The  "afterthought"  had  thus  become  the  main  object 
of  his  journey,  and  the  friends  at  home,  who  could  not 
see  much  rest  for  him  in  such  an  enterprise,  had  to  con- 
sole themselves  with  the  knowledge  that  he  would 
perforce  have  to  spend  at  least  fifteen  weeks  at  sea. 

Throughout  Canada  he  was  received  with  great 
cordiality  and  he  sent  home  interesting  but  none 
too  optimistic  impressions  of  the  social  conditions  pre- 
vailing in  the  Dominion  and  of  the  state'  of  Labour  and 
Socialist  organisation.  Here,  as  everywhere  during  his 

248 


INDIA 

tour,  in  conference  with  Trade  Union  and  Socialist 
leaders,  he  broached  the  idea  of  a  world-wide  Labour 
Federation,  as  a  practical  and  effective  supplement  to 
the  Socialist  International,  not  with  any  hope  of  its 
materialising  quickly,  but  simply  by  way  of  sowing  seed 
that  might  bring  forth  fruit  in  the  future.  He  derived 
much  benefit  in  health  from  his  brief  sojourn  in  Canada 
and  did  not  meet  with  any  hostility  of  any  kind. 

From  the  moment,  however,  of  his  arrival  in  India 
it  became  evident  that  those  interests  to  which  it  was 
not  suitable  that  "light  should  be  let  in  upon  dark 
places'*  had  made  preparations  to  prejudice  him  as  a 
witness  for  the  truth  in  the  eyes  of  the  British  people. 
The  fact  that  there  was  grave  discontent  among  large 
sections  of  the  people  of  India,  arising  out  of  the  recent 
partition  of  Bengal,  made  it  easy  for  the  people  at  home 
to  accept  as  true  the  luridly  coloured  pictures  of  Keir 
Hardie  as  a  fomenter  of  that  discontent.  By  the  end 
of  September,  sensational  reports,  telegraphed  through 
Reuter,  of  his  sayings  and  doings  in  India  began  to 
reach  this  country,  and  were  given  great  prominence 
and  wide  circulation  in  the  press. 
jTie  was  described  as  going  about  influencing  the 
minds  of  the  Bengalis,  fomenting  sedition,  and  under- 
mining British  rule.  He  was  reported  to  have  said  that 
"the  condition  of  Bengal  was  worse  than  that  of  Russia/' 
and  that  "the  atrocities  committed  by  officials  would, 
if  they  were  known,  evoke  more  horror  in  England  than 
the  Turkish  outrages  in  Armenia."  l"Whereupon/3  said 
a  friendly  commentator,  "the  Yellow  Press  was  seized 
with  a  violent  eruption.  It  vomited  forth  volumes  of 
smoke  and  flame  and  mud,  and  roared  at  Keir  Hardie 
like  a  thousand  bellowing  Bulls  of  Bashan,  and  even 
journals  less  tainted  with  insanity  felt  extremely  shocked 
and  took  upon  themselves  to  administer  censure  upon 

249 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  author  of  this  'scandalous  utterance."  Even 
"Punch"  joined  in  the  vituperation  with  a  cartoon  by 
Mr.  Linley  Sambourne,  which  showed  Britannia  gripping 
the  agitator  by  the  scruff  of  the  neck  and  apostrophising 
him  :  "Here,  you'd  better  come  home.  We  know  all 
about  you  here — you'll  do  less  harm."  At  the  time  that 
this  disgraceful  attack  was  being  made,  the  Indian 
authorities  were  writing  home  appreciative  accounts 
of  his  doings.  }  For  a  full  fortnight  Hardie  was 
-'  the  most  violently  detested  man  throughout  the 
English-speaking  world,  for,  of  course,  this  mighty 
noise  had  its  reverberations  in  every  corner  of  the 
Empire,  and  also  in  America,  j  Knowing  full  well 
that  his  colleagues  at  home  woulcl  have  some  difficulty 
in  withstanding  the  storm  of  misrepresentation,  he  sent 
a  cablegram  to  the  "Daily  Mail"  giving  a  brief  review 
of  the  economic  conditions  and  political  situation  in 
Bengal,  and  concluding  with  the  following  significant 
caution  :  "People  at  home  should  be  careful  of  trusting 
reports,  especially  of  Renter's  agents.  The  grossly  dis- 
torted home  reports  are  publicly  censured  by  the  leading 
Calcutta  journals.  Amusement  here  this  morning  at 
the  cabled  comments  of  the  'Daily  Mail,'  'Times'  and 
'Standard'  in  their  leading  columns.  They  have  been 
misled  by  Reuter.— J.  Keir  Hardie." 

In  reply  to  a  "Daily  Mail"  inquiry  whether  he  had 
really  made  this  specific  statement  attributed  to  him,  he 
replied  :— 

"Calcutta,  Thursday,  October  3rd. 

"The  statements  are  fabrications.  I  said  that  the 
prohibitions  of  meetings,  etc.,  reminded  me  of  Russia, 
and  the  violation  of  Hindu  women  by  Mohammedan 
rowdies  reminded  me  of  Armenia,  and  that  Colonial 
Government  was  the  ultimate  goal. — Keir  Hardie." 

And  yet,  on  the  very  same  day  on  which  he  cabled 

250 


INDIA 

his  repudiation  of  the  statement  attributed  to  him, 
Reuter's  Calcutta  correspondent  sent  a  cable  to  the 
British  press  in  which  he  stated  that  "Mr.  Keir  Hardie, 
M.P.,  admitted  in  an  interview  that  the  statements 
attributed  to  him  were  not  exaggerated."  Thus  lie 
followed  lie  in  a  kind  of  cuttlefish  endeavour  to  obscure 
the  truth,  the  real  purpose  of  the  detractors  being  to 
discredit  the  very  serious  statements  which  Hardie 
actually  did  make  concerning  the  state  of  matters  in 
India. 

Hardie's  own  exposure  of  these  misrepresentations 
was  quickly  followed  by  that  of  the  Indian  press,  which 
unanimously  testified  to  the  correctness  of  his  bearing. 
"None  of  the  papers  here,  either  English  or  native," 
said  a  Central  News  message,  "has  taken  much  exception 
to  his  conduct,  which  is  thought  to  have  been,  on  the 
whole,  quite  proper  and  discreet,  as  becoming  the 
honoured  guest  of  the  Maharajah  of  Mymensingh,  one 
of  the  signatories  of  the  loyal  Manifesto,  and  of  several 
prominent  officials." 

Most  satisfactory  was  the  attitude  of  his  colleagues  at 
home  in  the  face  of  all  the  obloquy  and  abuse.  The 
"Labour  Leader,"  speaking  for  the  I.L.P.,  declared 
that  "the  Party  would  stand  solidly  with  him  in  con- 
veying to  the  Indian  people  the  strongest  expression  of 
the  sympathy  and  support  of  British  Socialists  in  their 
struggle  against  social  and  political  oppression." 

Robert  Blatchford,  in  the  "Clarion,"  appealed  to  the 
British  press  for  fair  play.  Mr.  Cunninghame  Graham's 
utterance  was  characteristic  and  at  the  same  time  repre- 
sentative of  general  Socialist  opinion  in  the  country. 
Declaring  that  he  honoured  and  respected  Keir  Hardie 
for  all  he  had  endeavoured  to  do  in  Calcutta  and  British 
India,  he  said,  "There  were  many  millions  of  popula- 
tion in  the  country,  the  discreetest  millions  of  the  dis- 

251 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

creetest  population  the  world  had  ever  known,  but  there 
were  few  Keir  Hardies — there  were  few  men  who,  like 
Keir  Hardie,  had  risen  from  the  depths  of  poverty  to 
such  a  position  as  he  now  occupied."  Our  position  in 
India  was  but  for  a  time,  and  he  held  that  the  utter- 
ances of  Keir  Hardie  would  do  much  to  prepare  the 
minds  of  the  native  Indians,  and  cause  them  to  think 
of  the  benefits  of  free  institutions.  Instead  of  deporting 
Keir  Hardie  from  India,  he  thought  "they  ought  to  send 
an  ironclad  to  bring  him  home  as  the  first  man  who  had 
broken  through  prejudice,  and  given  the  right  hand  of 
fellowship  to  their  down-trodden  brethren." 

These  words  undoubtedly  reflected  the  views  of  the 
Socialist  movement,  and  also  of  many  people  outside 
of  it. 

The  attacks  on  Hardie,  on  this  as  on  so  many  previous 
occasions,  had  exactly  the  opposite  effect  from  what  was 
intended,  and  he  emerged  from  the  tempest  holding  a 
higher  place  than  ever  in  the  estimation  of  the  thought- 
ful sections  of  the  community,  while  he  had  the 
satisfaction  of  knowing  that  public  attention  had  been 
focussed  on  the  question  of  the  government  of  India  as 
it  had  never  been  since  the  days  of  the  Mutiny.  Com- 
placent and  self-satisfied  British  citizens  who  had  only 
heard  vaguely  of  the  partition  of  Bengal,  and  had  no 
idea  at  all  of  what  it  implied,  began  to  realise  that  all 
was  not  well  in  our  manner  of  governing  what  the  news- 
papers called  the  "Indian  Empire." 

Happily,  it  is  not  necessary  to  overload  this  memoir 
with  a  detailed  account  of  Hardie's  progress  through 
India.  That  is  to  be  found  in  his  book  "India  :  Impres- 
sions and  Suggestions,"  first  published  in  1909;  a 
second  edition,  issued  in  1917  by  the  Home  Rule  for 
India  League  with  a  valuable  foreword  by  Philip 
Snowden,  is  now  available. 

252 


INDIA 

He  spent  two  months  in  India,  and  visited  Bengal, 
Northern  India,  and  two  of  the  native  States — Baroda 
and  Mysore.  He  mingled  with  all  classes — Anglo- 
Indian  officials,  native  princes,  rulers  and  magistrates, 
peasants  and  factory  workers,  Mohammedans  and 
Hindus ;  with  all  on  terms  of  equality — that  being  pro- 
bably his  greatest  offence  in  the  eyes  of  certain  sections 
of  the  Anglo- Indians  who  regard  the  maintenance  of 
the  "colour  line"  as  a  necessary  bulwark  of  British 
supremacy.  Hardie,  naturally,  could  not  recognise  any 
social  or  race  barriers,  and  held  steadfastly  to  his 
intention,  publicly  declared  before  leaving  Britain,  that 
he  "would  know  no  colour,  race  or  creed."  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  he  knew  them  all,  but  made  no  distinction 
between  any  of  them,  and  thereby  won  the  esteem  and 
confidence  of  all  classes  in  India,  and  was  enabled  to 
see  the  inner  life  of  the  people  as  no  previous  visitor 
had  been  allowed  to  see  it.  In  this  respect,  as  in  many 
others  during  the  course  of  his  life,  he  was  a  pioneer. 
The  breach  which  he  made  in  the  wall  of  prejudice  has 
never  been  quite  closed,  and  through  it  there  has  passed 
much  goodwill  from  the  common  people  of  Britain  to 
the  common  people  of  India. 

By  this  time  Hardie  was  beginning  to  be  somewhat 
homesick  and  longing  to  be  in  the  thick  of  the  political 
fray  at  Westminster.  The  visit  to  Ceylon  was  interesting 
but  uneventful,  and  at  Colombo  he  debated  with  him- 
self whether  it  would  not  be  better  after  all  to  leave 
out  Australia  and  South  Africa,  and  "make  a  bee-line 
for  the  Lugar,  via  the  Red  Sea."  "The  fact  is,"  he 
wrote,  "the  trip  is  too  long,  and  I  see  the  new  session 
opening  and  me  still  on  the  water,  and  I  like  not  that." 
His  health  had  evidently  considerably  improved,  and 
with  restored  strength  came  renewed  confidence  in  him- 
self, and  he  was  yearning  to  be  free  to  face  his  critics. 

253 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

His  experiences  in  the  Australian  colonies  were,  in 
the  nature  of  things,  in  strong  contrast  with  his  experi- 
ences in  India.  He  was  amongst  a  free  people,  in  the 
one  part  of  the  world  where  genuine  experiment  was 
being  made  in  the  principles  and  practice  of  self- 
government,  and  he  was  naturally  intent  on  studying— 
as  far  as  his  short  tour  would  allow — the  various  phases 
and  aspects  of  that  experiment.  But  he  made  no  claim 
that  the  notes  which  he  sent  home  should  be  regarded 
as  anything  more  than  the  personal  impressions  of  a 
keenly  interested  wayfarer.  He  was  well  received 
everywhere,  in  West  and  South  Australia,  in  Victoria, 
and  New  Zealand,  and  New  South  Wales,  and  regretted 
very  much  that  he  had  to  leave  out  Queensland  and 
Tasmania.  He  had  to  speak  at  numerous  public  recep- 
tions organised  in  his  honour.  One  or  two  attempts  to 
raise  prejudice  against  him,  based  upon  the  press 
reports  of  his  Indian  tour,  melted  away  immediately  on 
personal  contact  with  him.  He  visited  the  gold  fields 
at  Koolgardie  and  Bendigo,  the  lead  and  copper  mines 
at  Broken  Hill,  and,  of  course,  the  coal  mines  at  New- 
castle— at  all  these  places  talking,  as  was  his  wont,  as 
a  miner  to  his  fellow  craftsmen.  He  renewed  his  friend- 
ship with  Andrew  Fisher,  his  early  associate  in  the 
formation  of  the  Ayrshire  Miners'  Union,  then  and  now 
one  of  Australia's  leading  statesmen,  and  still  true  to  his 
democratic  upbringing.  He  met  scores  of  old  friends 
wherever  he  went,  Scottish  and  Welsh  friends  especially 
claiming  kinship  and  clanship.  He  spent  many  social 
hours  with  them  cracking  about  old  times  in  the  old 
country  and  singing  the  old  songs,  and  generally  giving 
free  scope  to  those  social  instincts  which  were  always 
strong  within  him.  At  Adelaide  he  even  went  so  far  as 
to  allow  himself  to  be  impressed  into  playing  in  a  cricket 
match — Press  and  Parliament — and  he  records  with  a 

254 


AUSTRALASIA 

kind  of  boyish  glee  :  "I  carried  off  my  bat  for  eight  runs, 
one  hit  counting  for  four."  Probably  bowlers  and 
fielders  were  kind  to  him.  He  enjoyed  himself 
thoroughly,  and  from  the  health  point  of  view  the  Aus- 
tralian visit  was  undoubtedly  the  most  beneficial  part 
of  the  world  tour.  Yet  it  came  near  making  an  end  of 
his  career.  While  on  a  short  motor  trip  out  from  Wel- 
lington, New  Zealand,  the  car  in  which  he  was  travelling- 
went  over  an  embankment,  throwing  him  some  fifteen 
or  sixteen  feet  down  towards  a  stream  at  the  bottom. 
He  was  only  saved  from  a  complete  descent  by  contact 
with  trees  and  shrubbery.  No  bones  were  broken,  but 
he  was  badly  shaken  and  had  to  rest  for  several  days. 
Describing  the  occurrence  in  a  letter  home,  he  said  : 
"The  accident  has  quite  upset  my  New  Zealand  tour  so 
far  as  the  South  Island  is  concerned,  but  bad  as  this  is, 
it  might  easily  have  been  worse.  Doubtless  there  are 
those  who  would  account  for  it  by  quoting  the  old  saw, 
'Deil's  bairns  hae  their  deddie's  luck/  If  there  be 
such,  I  am  not  the  one  to  gainsay  them." 

From  his  summing  up  of  his  Australian  experiences 
one  passage  may  be  quoted,  especially  as  it  seems  to 
show  some  modification  of  his  attitude  towards  the 
Citizen  Army  idea,  a  modification,  however,  which  ife 
overborne  by  his  main  argument.  Referring  to  the 
fixed  policy  of  a  "White  Australia,"  in  defence  of  which 
he  recognised  that  the  Australasian  "would  fight  as  for 
no  other  ideal,"  and  to  the  proposals  arising  out  of  that 
for  an  Australian  navy  and  compulsory  military  ser- 
vice, he  wrote  :  "Now,  I  who  hate  militarism  and  every- 
thing it  stands  for,  readily  admit  that  the  conditions  of 
the  Australian  continent  are  different  from  those  of 
Great  Britain.  Further,  if  the  choice  is  between  an 
armed  nation  and  a  professional  army,  my  preference  is 
for  the  former.  But  in  this,  as  in  all  else,  everything 

255 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

depends  upon  who  is  to  control  the  army.  With  Labour 
controlling  the  Parliament  and  owning  the  press,  the 
danger  of  playing  with  arms  would  be  reduced  to  a 
minimum.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  professional  sol- 
dier and  the  Imperialist  politician  are  to  run  the  show, 
the  danger  is  too  great  to  be  taken  on.  Were  I  in 
Australian  politics  at  this  moment,  I  would  resist  to  the 
end  every  proposal  for  giving  militarism  the  least  foot- 
hold in  the  Commonwealth.  The  Japanese  bogey, 
when  it  is  not  a  fraud,  is  the  concoction  of  a  frenzied 
brain,  destitute  of  all  knowledge  of  European  politics. 
Great  Britain  is  the  last  country  on  the  map  of  the 
world  with  which  the  Japanese  will  care  to  embroil 
themselves.  The  experiment  of  keeping  Australia  white 
is  a  great  one,  the  success  of  which  time  alone  can 
decide."  _ 

I^From  Australia  to  South  Africa  was  like  passing 
from  a  friendly  into  a  hostile  country.  He  had  to  run 
the  gauntlet  of  an  opposition  carefully  and  vindictively 
organised  by  the  gold  and  diamond  mining  interests 
whose  influence  largely  dominated  the  public  life  and 
controlled  the  press  of  the  South  African  colonies. 
Hardie  was  their  declared  enemy  and  the  avowed  friend 
of  the  Boers  and  of  the  natives.  He  had  championed 
the  Boer  Republic  all  through  the  war.  He  had  opposed 
bitterly,  and  not  ineffectively,  the  introduction  of 
Chinese  labour.  He  had  advocated  the  claims  of  the 
natives  for  fair  treatment,  and  his  impassioned  protests 
against  the  Natal  massacres  were  on  record  in  the  pages 
of  "Hansard"  and  in  the  columns  of  the  "Labour 
Leader";  and,  greatest  sin  of  all,  he  was  the  living 
symbol  of  organised  Labour,  now  beginning  to  assert 
itself  in  South  Africa  as  elsewhere.  The  opposition 
manifested  itself  in  calculated  and  unbridled  rowdyism, 
unchecked  by  the  authorities,  except  at  Johannesburg, 

256 


SOUTH   AFRICA 

where  murder  was  feared.  At  Ladysmith,  the  win- 
dows of  the  hotel  in  which  he  stayed  were  smashed  by 
the  paid  rowdies,  "no  one,  not  even  the  hotel-keeper, 
trying  to  restrain  them."  At  Johannesburg  a  gang  had 
been  organised,  and  a  detachment  was  sent  to  Pretoria, 
where  the  crowd,  after  the  meeting,  was  the  most 
turbulent  of  any,  and  smashed  the  carriage  in  which  he 
drove  back  to  the  hotel  with  stones  and  other  missiles. 
At  Durban,  there  were  similar  disturbances.  Yet  at 
all  these  places  he  managed  to  address  public  meetings 
organised  by  the  local  Trades  Councils  and  the 
Socialists,  bodyguards  capable  of  protecting  him,  at 
considerable  risk  to  themselves,  from  actual  violence 
to  his  person  being  provided  from  amongst  his  friends. 

Through  it  all  he  moved  unperturbed,  and  did  not 
allow  the  rough  treatment  he  had  received  to  colour  his 
impressions.  Thus,  for  example,  at  Johannesburg,  he 
describes  a  two  thousand  feet  mine  which  he  visited  as 
being  well  ventilated  and  the  timbering  the  finest  he 
had  seen  anywhere.  He  noted  that  the  compounds, 
especially  the  newer  parts,  were  clean  and  comfortable, 
and  that  the  Chinamen  were  living  under  much  better 
sanitary  conditions  than  they  enjoyed  at  home.  At  the 
same  time  he  points  out  that  "there  are  empty  houses, 
and  unemployed  workmen,  and  much  woe  and  want  in 
the  Rand,"  and  that,  "nevertheless,  the  mines  pay 
£7,000,000  a  year  in  dividends.55 

He  deplored  the  prevalence  of  the  opinion,  as  much 
amongst  working  people  as  amongst  other  classes,  that'X 
"South  Africa  should  be  made  a  white  man's  country 
and  the  nigger  kept  in  his  proper  place,"  and  he  pointed 
out  that  the  white  man,  by  refusing  to  work  and  by  get- 
ting the  Kaffir  to  work  for  him  under  his  supervision, 
was  tacitly  admitting  that  South  Africa  was  not,  and 
never  could  be,  a  white  man's  country.  The  native 

257 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

question  he  regarded  as  South  Africa's  greatest  pro- 
blem, but  made  no  attempt  to  dogmatise  as  to  its 
solution.  He  was  impressed  by  the  shrewdness  and 
intelligence  of  the  South  African  native,  who,  he  pre- 
dicted, "would  put  up  a  fight  against  the  farmer  who 
wants  his  land,  and  the  miner  who  wants  his  labour  at 
starvation  wage."  Hardie  urged  that  the  Labour  move- 
ment at  home  and  in  South  Africa  should  combine  to 
save  the  South  African  natives  from  being  reduced  to 
the  position  of  "a  landless  proletariat  at  the  mercy  of 
their  exploiters  for  all  time.'' 

His  somewhat  pessimistic  conclusions  regarding  the 
South  African  outlook  were,  if  anything,  reinforced  by  a 
day  spent  in  the  company  of  Olive  Schreiner,  with  whom 
he  had  been  on  terms  of  friendship  since  before  the  war, 
and  whose  mind  was  filled  with  dark  forebodings  for 
the  future  of  her  country.  He  was  not  sorry  to  shake 
the  South  African  dust  from  his  feet  and  turn  his  face 
homewards. 

The  tour,  which  for  many  reasons  attracted  as  much 
public  interest  as  if  he  had  been  a  royal  personage,  had 
at  least  fulfilled  its  primary  purpose.  When  he  arrived 
in  Plymouth  in  the  last  week  of  March,  he  appeared  to 
be  in  splendid  health.  "I  have  never  seen  him  looking 
so  well,  though  his  grey  hair  has  whitened  a  little,"  said 
Glasier,  who  was  amongst  the  welcoming  party.  "He 
presented  a  most  picturesque  figure,  as  he  stood,  erect 
as  ever,  sunburnt  and  aglow,  in  his  tweed  suit,  his  gray 
Tam-o'-Shanter,  and  with  his  Indian  shawl  slung  round 
his  shoulder,  he  struck  one  as  a  curious  blend  between, 
a  Scottish  shepherd  and  an  Indian  rajah.  He  avows 
that  he  has  stuck  to  his  Scotch  porridge  for  breakfast 
six  days  a  week  with  a  'tea  breakfast'  on  Sundays." 

Among  the  first  news  he  received  on  landing  was  that 
the  Socialist  students  of  Glasgow  University  had 

258 


HOME 

nominated  him  for  the  Lord  Rectorship,  thus  making 
him  involuntarily  the  central  figure  in  quite  a  new  sphere 
of  Socialist  propaganda.  The  election,  which  created 
widespread  interest,  took  place  in  the  following  October, 
after  an  unusually  exciting  fight.  Hardie  himself,  in 
accordance  with  traditional  etiquette  in  such  contests, 
took  no  part.  The  nomination  speech  was  made  by 
H.  M.  Hyndman,  and  other  speakers  who  addressed 
the  students  on  behalf  of  Hardie's  candidature  were 
Cunninghame  Graham,  Herbert  Burrows,  Mrs.  Cobden 
Sanderson,  Victor  Grayson  and  the  Rev.  Stitt  Wilson,  of 
America,  while  messages  in  support  were  sent  by  Dr. 
Alfred  Russel  Wallace,  George  Bernard  Shaw,  H.  G. 
Wells,  the  Rev.  R.  J.  Campbell,  and  others  well  known 
in  the  world  of  literature  and  politics.  The  leading 
spirit  in  this  unique  campaign  was  Thomas  Johnston,  a 
former  student  at  the  University,  founder  and  editor  of 
"Forward,"  and  now  well  known  as  the  author  of  the 
authoritative  "History  of  the  Working  Classes  of 
Scotland."  The  voting  figures  were  as  follows  : — 

Lord  Curzon        ...         ...     947 

Lloyd  George      ...         ...     935 

Keir  Hardie          122 

Twenty-two  of  Hardie's  votes  were  from  women  students. 
The  narrow  defeat  of  Lloyd  George  caused  much 
chagrin  amongst  Liberals. 


259 


CHAPTER    ELEVEN 

FOREIGN    POLICY — THE    KING?S    GARDEN    PARTY — ATTACKS 
FROM  WITHIN   AND   WITHOUT 

ALMOST    immediately    on   his   arrival,    Hardie 
found  himself  deeply  immersed    in    work,  and 
seemed  bent  on  squandering  somewhat  freely  the 
energy  he  had  gained  during  his  travels. 

The  period,  indeed,  is  so  crowded  with  events  in 
which  he  was  involved  that  it  is  well-nigh  impossible  to 
present  a  sequential  account  of  his  sayings  and  doings. 
There  was  the  usual  round  of  welcoming  demonstrations 
which  were  calculated  not  only  to  show  the  esteem  in 
which  he  was  held  by  the  Labour  movement,  but  also 
to  act  as  a  stimulus  to  that  movement.  The  meeting  in 
the  Albert  Hall.  London,  was  remarkable  for  size  and 
enthusiasm,  and  the  recipient  of  so  much  adulation 
might  have  been  pardoned  if  he  had  succumbed,  if  only 
temporarily,  to  the  disease  known  as  "swelled  head"  —a 
failing  not  unknown  amongst  popular  politicians. 
Hardie  was  not  without  his  share  of  self-esteem,  but  he 
never  allowed  it  to  magnify  into  a  grotesque  proportion 
his  place  in  the  movement.  These  demonstrations 
he  accepted  as  his  due,  but  he  valued  them  chiefly  as 
Labour's  answer  to  the  misrepresentations  and  abuse 
that  had  been  so  lavishly  showered  upon  him.  If  his 
own  people  believed  in  him,  he  cared  not  who  was 
against  him. 

He  had  also  to  make  a  tour  of  his  constituency,  where 
his  reception  was  such  as  to  assure  him  that  the  attacks 

260 


FOREIGN    POLICY 

made  upon  him  had  not  weakened,  but  had  rather 
strengthened,  the  fidelity  of  his  supporters.  South 
Wales  had  now  become  a  kind  of  second  home  to  him, 
where  he  was  as  much  at  his  ease,  and  had  friendships 
as  intimate,  as  in  Ayrshire  or  Glasgow. 

Following  quickly  upon  these  platform  appearances 
came  the  I.L.P.  Conference  at  Huddersfield,  at  which 
there  were  some  signs  of  division  over  the  Party's 
connection  with  the  Labour  Party.  The  trouble  centred 
round  Victor  Grayson,  who  had  been  elected  for  the 

SColne  Valley  division  in  the  previous  year,  under  con- 
ditions which  did  not  strictly  conform  to  Labour  Party 
rules,  and  which  had  prevented  his  official  endorsement 
either  by  the  N.A.C.  or  by  the  Labour  Party  Executive. 
The  former  body,  however,  made  itself  responsible  for 
paying  him  his  share  of  the  Parliamentary  Maintenance 
Fund,  from  which  the  I.L.P.  helped  its  Parliamentary 
representatives.  The  Conference  sustained  the  N.A.C. 
attitude  by  a  large  majority.  Thereafter,  a  resolution— 
to  which  Grayson  agreed — was  passed,  declaring  that 
"during  the  remainder  of  Parliament  his  relations  to  the 
Labour  Party  should  be  the  same  as  that  of  all  the  other 
I.L.P.  members,  except  in  the  case  of  his  being  placed 
upon  the  Parliamentary  Fund."  This  dispute,  through- 
out which  Hardie  played  the  part  of  peacemaker,  seems 
in  perspective  somewhat  trivial,  but  at  the  time  it  looked 
to  be  very  serious,  and  there  were  not  wanting  those 
who  hoped  to  see  it  result  either  in  the  break  up  of  the 
I.L.P.  or  in  its  severance  from  the  Labour  Party. 

This  Conference,  however,  was  chiefly  remarkable  for 
its  pronouncements  on  foreign  affairs,  and  especially 
upon  the  agreement  with  the  Russian  Government, 
which  it  declared  was  equivalent  to  "giving  an  informal 
sanction  to  the  course  of  infamous  tyranny  which  has 
suppressed  every  semblance  of  representation  and  has 

s  261 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

condemned  great  numbers  of  our  Russian  comrades  to 
imprisonment,  torture  and  death."  A  resolution  was 
also  passed  protesting  against  the  "shameless  exploita- 
tion of  the  Congo  by  the  Government  of  King  Leopold, 
and  calling  upon  the  British  Government  to  take  such 
action  as  may  compel  a  more  humane  treatment  of  the 
natives  of  the  Congo."  This  was  followed  by  a  resolu- 
tion, moved  by  Hardie  and  seconded  by  Joseph  Burgess, 
demanding  "that  the  people  of  India  should  be  given 
more  effective  control  over  their  own  affairs."  In  the 
course  of  his  speech,  Hardie  cited  the  native  States  of 
Baroda,  Mysore  and  Travancore  as  proof  of  the  fitness 
of  the  Indian  people  for  self-government.  In  one  or 
other  of  these  States,  he  affirmed,  he  had  found  parish 
councils  established,  he  had  found  the  caste  system  dis- 
appearing, and  he  had  found  compulsory  free  education, 
and  in  one  of  them  there  was  a  popularly  elected  Annual 
Parliament  meeting  and  discussing  national  affairs. 
"The  whole  of  the  administration,  from  the  humblest 
office  right  up  to  the  chief,  was  filled  by  natives  and  the 
administration  of  the  affairs  of  those  States  was  a  model 
to  the  rest  of  India."  In  face  of  the  momentous  issues 
raised  by  these  resolutions,  the  Grayson  incident 
dwindled  into  insignificance,  and  the  somewhat  ran- 
corous feelings  which  it  had  evoked  melted  away  in  the 
general  recognition  of  the  great  purposes  for  which  the 
I.L.P.  existed. 

Three  keenly  contested  by-elections  occurring  almost 
simultaneously,  at  Dewsbury,  Dundee  and  Montrose 
Burghs,  in  all  of  which  the  Labour  candidates  were 
defeated,  afforded  opportunity  for  big  scale  propaganda 
in  which,  as  a  matter  of  course,  Hardie  played  a  pro- 
minent part,  evidently  quite  forgetful  of  the  fact  that 
only  a  year  before  he  had  been  almost  at  death's  door. 

At  the  same  time,  Parliamentary  affairs  developed  in 

262 


FOREIGN   POLICY 

such  a  way  as  to  throw  him  once  more  very  prominently 
into  the  limelight.  Sir  Henry  Campbell-Bannerman 
had  retired  from  the  Premiership  and  was  succeeded 
by  Mr.  Asquith,  a  decided  change  for  the  worse  from 
the  democratic  standpoint,  and  almost  of  sinister  import 
having  regar3  to  the  new  Premier's  imperialistic  tenden- 
cies and  the  international  alliances  which  were  in  process 
of  being  formed.  Notwithstanding  the  repeated  in- 
quiries of  MacDonald  and  other  Labour  Members  for 
information  concerning  the  agreements  which  had  been 
coine  to  with  tBe  Czar's  Government,  no  satisfactory  or 
informative  statement  had  been  vouchsafed,  and  there 
were  strong  reasons  for  the  suspicion  that  these  agree- 
ments were  of  such  a  character  as  to  involve  this  country 
in  grave  and  unavoidable  responsibility  in  the  event  of 
an  outbreak  of  war  in  Europe.  When,  therefore,  the 
announcement  was  made  that  King  Edward  was  to  pay 
an  official  visit  to  the  Czar  at  Reval,  these  suspicions 
seemed  to  fine!  confirmation,  and  it  became  the  duty  of 
all  friends  of  international  peace  to  protest.  The  fact 
that  it  was  a  Liberal  Government  which  was  pursuing 
a  policy  quite  in  line  with  the  designs  of  the  Tory  Party 
threw  the  onus  of  opposition  upon  Labour,  and  against 
the  combined  forces  of  the  two  imperialist  parties, 
Labour  was  in  a  hopeless  minority  and  could  do  little 
more  than  make  its  protest  in  such  a  way  as  to  arrest 
the  attention  of  the  nations. 

Labour  was  opposed  to  the  ostentatious  recognition 
of  the  Czar's  Government,  not  only  because  of  the  dan- 
gerous international  commitments  which  it  implied,  but 
also  because  of  the  flagrantly  despotic  character  of  that 
Government  which  at  that  very  time  was  engaged  in 
suppressing  with  calculated  savagery  every  semblance 
of  constitutional  rule.  On  every  I.L.P.  platform 
throughout  the  country  the  King's  visit  to  the  Czar  was 

263 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

strongly  condemned,  Hardie,  of  course,  being  in  the 
very  forefront  of  the  attack.  Under  the  title,  "Consort- 
ing with  Murderers,"  he  cpntributed  a  powerful  article 
to  the  "Labour  Leader,"  detailing  the  crimes  of  Czar- 
dom  during  the  previous  three  years  since  the  formation 
of  the  first  Duma,  which  he  contended  had  only  been 
conceded  for  the  purpose  of  giving  confidence  to 
European  financiers  so  as  to  induce  them  to  advance 
money  to  the  Czar's  Government,  a  contention  which 
had  found  confirmation  in  the  fact  that  immediately  on 
the  successful  flotation  of  a  loan  of  £90,000,000  the 
newly-formed  Duma  had  been  forcibly  disbanded,  and 
one  hundred  and  sixty-nine  of  its  members  arrested  and 
imprisoned  on  the  flimsiest  charge,  while  seventy-four 
members  of  the  second  Duma  had  shared  the  same  fate. 
The  article  gave  the  official  figures  of  persons  butchered 
by  the  Black  Hundred  under  Czarist  auspices  as  19,000 
in  two  years,  and  the  number  of  political  prisoners 
executed  during  the  same  time  as  3,205;  and  it  stated 
that,  during  two  months  of  the  current  year,  1,587 
persons  had  been  condemned  to  death  or  penal  servitude 
for  no  other  reason  than  for  being  Radicals  or  Socialists. 
"The  Czar  and  his  Government  have  been  singled  out 
for  honour  by  a  Liberal  Government.  What  is  the 
explanation?"  The  article  went  on  to  show  that  Rus- 
sian finances  were  again  in  a  bankrupt  condition.  The 
Budget  for  the  year  showed  a  deficit  of  £20,000,000. 
The  Russian  debt  was  £665,000,000,  and  there  were 
projects  for  a  new  navy  and  a  new  military  railway  at 
a  cost  pf  £70,000,000.  A  new  loan  was  necessary. 
"Financial  reasons,  therefore,"  continued  the  article, 
"probably  explain  why  King  Edward  has  been  advised 
by  his  responsible  advisers  to  pay  this  official  visit  to 
a  monarch  reeking  with  the  blood  of  his  slaughtered 
subjects.  The  Stock  Exchange  hook  needed  to  be 

264 


FOREIGN    POLICY 

baited.  Two  years  ago  the  bait  was  a  popularly  elected 
Duma;  this  time  it  is  a  Royal  crown.  Truly  kings  have 
their  uses." 

Language  of  this  kind  was  not  calculated  to  raise 
its  author  in  the  esteem  either  of  royalty  or  of  the 
financiers,  nor  was  the  persistence  which  the  Labour 
Party  showed  in  bringing  the  question  into  the  House 
of  Commons  likely  to  be  viewed  with  favour  by  the  two 
other  parties,  who  were  at  one  on  the  question  of 
Russian  policy. 

On  June  3rd,  Hardie  came  into  conflict  with  the 
Speaker  over  the  rejection  of  a  question  which  he  had 
put  down  as  to  the  persecution  of  political  prisoners 
in  Russia — particulars  of  which  he  detailed — asking 
whether  the  British  Government  meant  to  make  any 
protest  or  to  continue  relations  with  the  Czar's  Govern- 
ment. The  question  was  disallowed  as  reflecting  upon 
"a  friendly  Power"  !  Notwithstanding  its  rejection,  he 
managed  to  gain  full  publicity  for  it,  which  was  all 
he  would  probably  have  got  even  if  he  had  been  allowed 
to  put  it.  With  all  his  directness,  he  was  an  astute 
parliamentarian. 

The  following  day,  in  committee  on  the  Foreign 
Office  vote,  Mr.  James  O'Grady,  speaking  for  the 
Labour  Party,  in  an  exceedingly  effective  speech,  moved 
that  the  salary  of  the  Secretary  of  State  be  reduced,  in 
order  that  he  might  raise  the  question  of  the  King's 
visit  to  Russia.  In  the  subsequent  debate,  Hardie 
again  incurred  the  censure  of  the  chairman,  who  objected 
to  the  use  of  the  word  "atrocities"  as  applied  to  a 
friendly  Power,  and  on  Hardie  replying  that  he  knew 
no  other  word  in  the  English  language  to  express  his 
meaning,  a  scene  ensued,  which  provided  the  press  with 
many  columns  of  sensational  "copy."  The  chairman 
insisted  on  the  word  "atrocities,"  which  had  only  been 

265 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

used  once,  being  withdrawn.  Hardie  declined  to  with- 
draw it,  and  continued  on  his  feet,  debating  the  chair- 
man's ruling,  and  incidentally  impeaching  the  Russian 
Government.  Other  members  intervened,  mostly  in 
support  of  Hardie's  position,  until  at  last  the  chairman 
threatened  to  name  Hardie,  with  a  view  to  his  suspension. 
His  continued  refusal  brought  the  Prime  Minister  to  his 
feet  with  a  dexterous  definition  of  Parliamentary  law, 
and  a  direct  appeal  to  Hardie  to  accept  the  chairman's 
ruling.  After  a  very  evident  mental  conflict,  he 
reluctantly  agreed  to  withdraw  the  term  of  offence,  in 
order,  as  he  said,  "to  secure  a  division."  This  was 
certainly  a  mistake  in  tactics,  and  was  one  of  the  very 
few  errors  of  judgment  made  by  him  during  the  whole  of 
his  Parliamentary  career.  It  was  at  least  a  refutation  of 
the  charge  often  made  against  him  of  being  a  seeker  after 
notoriety.  Suspension  would  have  been  his  best  card 
if  notoriety  had  been  his  object,  but  it  would  also  have 
been  the  most  effective  way  of  bringing  home  the  nature 
of  the  controversy  to  the  public  mind,  and  for  that 
reason  it  would  have  been  better  if  he  had  held  his 
ground. 

The  most  unfortunate  feature  of  this  debate  was  the 
manner  of  its  ending,  Arthur  Henderson  moving  the 
closure  just  as  Victor  Grayson  rose  to  continue  the  de- 
bate. It  was  afterwards  explained  that  an  arrangement 
had  been  come  to  between  the  leaders  of  the  three 
parties  that  the  debate  should  close  at  a  certain  hour 
and  be  followed  by  a  division,  which  Grayson's  inter- 
vention would  have  prevented,  but  the  fact  that  it  was 
the  Labour  Party  leader  who  intervened  gave  some 
colour  to  the  accusation  made  in  some  quarters,  that 
Grayson  was  being  ostracised,  and  it  certainly  helped  to 
roughen  the  already  existing  friction. 

On  this  occasion  it  is  noteworthy  that  more  than  one- 

266 


FOREIGN  POLICY 

half  of  the  Liberal  Party  abstained  from  voting,  while 
the  Tories  voted  solidly  with  the  Liberal  Government, 
thus  confirming  Hardie's  oft-repeated  declaration  that^/ 
on  questions  of  foreign  policy,  the  Asquith-Grey- 
Haldane  administration  was  in  reality  a  Tory  Imperialist 
Government. 

There  wtCs  a  remarkable  sequel  to  this  debate,  an 
account  of  which  may  be  left  to  one  of  the  persons 
directly  involved,  all  the  more  as  it  provides  us  with 
another  of  those  contemporary  pen-portraits  of  Hardie 
which  have  genuine  biographical  value.  The  witness  is 
Arthur  Ponsonby,  who  had  recently  entered  the  House 
as  the  successor  to  Sir  Henry  Campbell-Bannerman 
in  the  representation  of  Stirling  Burghs.  Says  Mr. 
Ponsonby:  "I  first  met  Keir  Hardie  at  a  luncheon 
party  in  the  House  of  Commons  before  I  myself  was  in 
the  House.  Amongst  others,  another  highly  placed, 
successful,  and  prominent  Labour  leader  was  present. 
I  remember  contrasting  the  two,  and  I  was  immensely 
struck  by  Keir  Hardie's  reticence  and  his  occasional 
incisive  remarks,  which  were  very  different  from  his 
colleague's  voluble  assurance.  I  decided  inwardly 
that  K.H.  was  the  genuine  article.  My  upbringing  and 
the  fact  that  I  was  a  Liberal  connected  more  or  less 
at  the  time  with  officialism,  I  thought  might  give  him  a 
prejudice  against  me,  but,  on  the  contrary,  he  regarded 
me  approvingly  and  I  felt  sympathy  in  his  extra- 
ordinarily kindly  smile.  But  I  had  only  a  nodding 
acquaintance  with  him  till  1908,  when  we  were  thrown 
together  in  very  peculiar  circumstances.  I  had  only 
been  a  fortnight  in  the  House  when  a  debate  came  on 
in  which  the  Government  defended  the  advice  they  had 
given  King  Edward  to  visit  the  Czar  at  Reval.  This 
explanation  appeared  to  me  entirely  inadequate.  The 
people  of  Russia  were  long  oppressed  and  persecuted 

267 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

in  an  abominable  way,  and  I  thought  it  morally  and 
practically  wrong  that  this  compliment  should  be  paid 
to  the  oppressor  by  a  country  which  should  always  be 
on  the  side  of  the  oppressed.  Without  any  hesitation  I 
voted  with  a  small  minority  of  Labour  men  and 
Radicals  against  the  Government.  Keir  Hardie  was 
among  the  number.  Shortly  afterwards,  King  Edward 
gave  a  garden  party  to  which  all  Members  of  the  House 
of  Commons  were  invited.  But  four  exceptions  were 
made.  One  member  whose  financial  reputation  was  not 
the  best,  Grayson,  who  had  made  one  or  two  ineffective 
demonstrations  in  the  House,  Keir  Hardie  and  myself. 
I  did  not  pay  much  attention  at  first,  thinking  there  was 
probably  some  error.  But  when  I  discovered  it  had 
been  done  very  deliberately,  and  at  the  King's  orders, 
the  incident  assumed  its  honest  proportions.  It  was  no 
longer  a  private  affair  but  an  insult  to  my  constituents 
and  an  attempt  by  the  sovereign  to  influence  votes  of 
Members  by  social  pressure.  Keir  Hardie  also  had 
been  inclined  to  let  the  matter  pass  as  an  entirely 
unimportant  incident.  But  when  I  put  it  to  him  that  it 
was  not  a  personal  matter,  but  an  official  aspersion  on 
our  constituencies,  he  agreed,  and  he  deliberated  with 
his  colleagues  as  to  what  course  should  be  taken.  The 
press  took  up  the  matter  with  embarrassing  eagerness 
and  the  whole  incident  became  embroidered  out  of  all 
proportion.  I  need  not  follow  the  course  of  events  so 
far  as  I  personally  was  concerned,  but  Keir  Hardie 
decided  eventually  to  let  the  matter  drop  after  explain- 
ing the  position  publicly  in  an  interesting  speech  at 
Stockport  in  which  he  showed  how  throughout  his  career 
he  had  seen  clearly  that  an  attack  on  monarchy  and  the 
advocacy  of  republican  principles  was  of  very  little 
consequence  as  compared  with  the  attack  on  the  economic 
system. 

268 


KING'S  GARDEN  PARTY 

"We  had  many  a  talk,  and  need  I  say  a  laugh,  over 
a  cup  of  tea  while  the  'crisis'  lasted,  and  we  sympathised 
with  one  another  in  our  efforts  to  avoid  the  pressmen. 
As  regards  the  constitutional  aspect  of  the  incident,  it 
is  interesting  to  recall  that  high  officials  in  no  way  in 
sympathy  with  our  views  had  no  doubt  that  the  royal 
disapproval  ought  never  to  have  been  expressed  in  this 
way.  In  the  'Dictionary  of  National  Biography*  the 
incident  is  referred  to  thus  :  '  Unwisely  the  King  took 
notice  of  the  parliamentary  criticism  of  his  action,  and 
cancelled  the  invitation  to  a  royal  garden  party  of  three 
Members  of  Parliament.  It  was  the  only  occasion 
during  the  reign  on  which  the  King  invited  any 
public  suspicion  of  misinterpreting  his  constitutional 
position.' 

"Subsequently,  whenever  I  made  a  speech  against  the 
competition  in  armaments,  or  the  policy  of  the  balance 
of  power,  or  on  any  subject  on  which  I  could  only  expect 
the  support  of  a  small  minority,  I  invariably  got  a  word 
of  encouragement  and  approval  from  Hardie. 

:c There  was  always  something  in  his  uncompromising 
directness  and  complete  indifference  to  the  approval  of 
the  majority  which  attracted  me.  He  was  often  blunder- 
ingly tactless  and  rough,  and  though  he  was  strictly 
obedient  to  the  forms  of  the  House,  he  never  indulged 
in  the  little  complimentary  politenesses  which  some 
Members  find  make  life  smoother.  All  this  seemed  to 
me  part  of  the  armour  he  wore  deliberately  against  the 
insinuating  influences  of  unaccustomed  surroundings, 
and  of  the  atmosphere  of  authority  to  which  men  brought 
up  in  a  very  different  sphere  of  life  not  infrequently  suc- 
cumb. He  seemed  determined  to  preserve  the  integrity 
of  his  opinions — dangerously  extreme  as  they  were 
thought  in  those  days,  and  to  the  end  he  succeeded. 
His  geniality,  his  kindliness,  and  his  appreciation  of  the 

269 


J.  KEIR  BARDIE 

gentler  arts  of  life,  came  as  a  surprise  to  those  who 
only  knew  him  publicly." 

Hardie's  own  references  to  the  matter  were  character- 
istic. He  had  no  use  for  Kings'  garden  parties.  He 
had  never  attended  any  of  them,  and  would  probably 
never  have  known  that  on  this  occasion  the  invitation 
had  not  been  sent  had  it  not  been  that  Ponsonby  and 
Grayson  were  also  implicated.  "But,"  said  he,  "I  am 
not  going  to  allow  either  my  position  as  a  member  of 
the  Labour  Party,  or  my  Socialism,  or  my  views  con- 
cerning King  Edward's  visit  to  Russia,  to  control  my 
principles  as  a  Member  of  the  House  of  Commons.  I 
don't  receive  these  invitations  because  I  am  Keir  Hardie, 
but  because  I  am  a  Member  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
and  if  I  am  fit  to  represent  the  working  classes  of 
Merthyr,  I  am  fit  to  attend  the  garden  party  at  Windsor. " 
His  views  concerning  the  monarchy  had  been  defined  on 
several  previous  occasions  and  it  was  hardly  necessary 
for  him  to  reiterate  his  opinion  that  it  was  a  wholly  super- 
fluous institution,  only  tolerable  as  long  as  it  did  not 
actively  interfere  in  the  administration  of  the  nation's 
affairs  or  in  directing  its  foreign  policy.  That  it  was  being 
so  used  in  Russian  (and,  as  we  now  know,  in  other) 
affairs,  there  could  not  be  any  doubt,  and  it  showed  its 
pettiness  by  this  paltry  ostracism.  The  Labour  Party 
at  once  took  up  the  matter.  If  a  king  could  take  cog- 
nisance of  one  Parliamentary  act,  then  the  constitutional 
theory  of  Parliamentary  independence  was  gone.  That 
week  it  therefore  passed  the  following  resolution  and 
sent  it  to  those  concerned  : — 

"That  the  action  of  Mr.  Hardie  regarding  the  King's 
visit  to  the  Czar,  which  incurred  the  displeasure  of  His 
Majesty  and  led  to  Mr.  Hardie's  name  being  removed 
from  the  list  of  Members  of  Parliament  recently  invited 
to  Windsor,  having  been  taken  by  instructions  of  the 

270 


KING'S  GARDEN  PARTY 

Party,  the  Party  desires  to  associate  itself  with  Mr. 
Hardie,  who,  in  its  opinion,  exercised  his  constitutional 
right  on  the  occasion  of  the  Foreign  Office  debate,  and 
it  therefore  requests  that,  until  his  name  is  restored  to 
such  official  lists,  the  names  of  all  its  members  shall 
be  removed  from  them." 

As  a  result,  assurances  were  officially  given  that  a 
mistake  had  been  made,  and  the  matter  was  allowed  to 

dfop. 

Following  close  upon  the  Government's  open  declara- 
tion of  friendliness  to  the  Czar's  regime,  came  a  raging, 
tearing  anti-German  press  campaign,  and  it  was  possible 
to  discern  in  the  propinquity  of  the  two  manifestations 
something  more  than  accidental  coincidence.  Its 
tendency  was  undoubtedly  to  stimulate  animosity 
between  the  people  of  Britain  and  Germany  and  render 
it  difficult  for  peace  lovers  in  both  countries  to  make 
headway  against  their  respective  militarist  elements. 
The  British  press  campaign,  naturally,  had  its  reflection 
in  the  German  press,  which  found  in  our  Dreadnought 
programmes,  our  alliance  with  Japan,  our  Persian  policy, 
and  our  highly  demonstrative  entente  with  France  and 
Russia,  the  evidence  of  a  policy  Designed  completely  to 
encompass  and  isolate  Germany. 

The  obvious  duty  of  Socialists  "In  both  countries  was 
to  give  effect  to  the  Marxian  call,  "Wage- workers  of  all 
countries  unite,"  and  the  most  serious  feature  of  the 
British  war  scare  was  that  the  scaremongers  included 
two  leading  Socialists,  Blatchford  of  the  "Clarion,"  and 
H.  M.  Hyndman  of  the  Social  Democratic  Federation. 
Blatchford  visualised  an  immediate  German  invasion  of 
Britain  and  told  hair-raising  stories  of  embarkation 
rehearsals  on  the  other  side  of  the  North  Sea.'  Hynd- 
man  inveighed  against  all  things  German,  and  advo- 
cated, as  he  had  always  done,  the  formation  of  a  citizen 

271 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

army,  not  primarily  to  resist  capitalism,  but  to  resist,  if 
not  to  attack,  Germany.  Even  Lord  Fisher,  who  was 
getting  his  Dreadnoughts  built,  was  constrained  to 
characterise  the  scare  as  silly.  "The  truth  is/5  said  he, 
referring  to  the  embarkation  story,  "that  one  solitary 
regiment  was  embarked  for  manoeuvres.  That  is  the 
truth.  I  have  no  doubt  that  equally  silly  stories  are 
current  in  Germany."  Unfortunately,  in  this  country 
the  "silly  stories"  haci  the  endorsement  of  two  promin- 
ent Socialists,  one  of  whom  was  believed  in  Germany 
to  be  representative  of  British  working-class  opinion. 
During  the  course  of  this  scare  there  were  sneering 
references  from  Blatchford  to  the  Labour  Party  as  the 
"Baa-Lamb  School  who  believe  that  we  ought  not  to 
defend  ourselves  if  attacked,"  as  the  "Ostrich  School 
who,  because  they  want  peace,  refuse  to  see  any  danger 
of  war";  as  the  "Gilpin  School,  who  had  a  frugal  mind 
and  wanted  peace  at  the  lowest  possible  price."  There 
were  also  references  to  Hardie  which  approached  the 
verge  of  insult.  Thus  the  capitalist-militarist  game  was 
played  and  an  international  Socialist  movement,  which 
alone  could  then  have  averted  war,  was  weakened. 

Hardie  retorted  with  a  strong  article,  the  very  com- 
prehensiveness of  which  renders  it  difficult  to  summarise. 
After  showing  that  Germany  had  nothing  to  gain  from 
war  with  Britain  and  that  there  were  interests  in  both 
countries  seeking  profit  out  of  the  increasing  expendi- 
ture on  armaments,  he  deprecated  the  fomenting  of 
antagonisms  by  avowed  Socialists.  He  accused  Hynd- 
man  of  having  ransacked  the  columns  of  the  gutter 
press  for  inuendoes  and  insults  levelled  against  the 
representatives  of  the  German  Empire,  and  of  dishing 
them  up  with  all  the  assurance  with  which  he  was  accus- 
tomed to  predict  the  date  of  the  Social  Revolution. 
"Blatchford  and  Hyndman,"  he  said,  "seem  to  have  set 

272 


FOREIGN  POLICY 

themselves  the  task  of  producing  that  very  feeling  of 
inevitableness  than  which  nothing  could  more  strengthen 
the  hands  of  the  warmongers  on  both  shores  of  the 
German  Ocean,  now  known,  I  believe,  as  the  North 
Sea.  Is  that  work  worthy  of  the  traditions  of  Socialism  ? 
I  assure  our  German  Socialist  and  Trade  Union  com- 
rades that  Blatchford  and  Hyndman  speak  for  them- 
selves alone,  and  that  their  attitude  on  this  question 
would  be  repudiated  with  practical  unanimity  by  the 
Trade  Union  movement  could  it  be  put  to  the  vote. 
The  Labour  Party  stands  for  peace.  We  are  prepared 
to  co-operate  with  our  German  friends  in  thwarting  the 
malignant  designs  of  the  small  group  of  interested  scare- 
mongers, who  in  both  countries  would  like  to  see  war 

break  out."  JjF 

There  was  an  immediate  response  to  this  closing 
appeal.  Bernstein  wrote  emphasising  the  danger  of 
stabilising  the  feeling  of  "inevitableness' '  as  to  war,  and 
did  not  minimise  the  fact  that  it  had  already  taken  deep 
root  amongst  sections  of  the  German  people.  He  de- 
clared it  to  be  "the  duty  of  Socialists  to  lift  their  voice 
against  the  mad  race  in  armaments  which  makes 
civilised  humanity,  to  its  shame,  the  slave  of  conditions 
which  it  ought  to  master."  Bebel  wrote  prophetically  : 
"A  war  between  England  and  Germany  would  lead  to  a 
European — that  is  to  a  world— conflagration  such  as 
has  never  before  taken  place.  The  German  Social 
Democratic  Party  will  do  its  utmost  to  prevent  such, 
but  should  it  happen  in  spite  of  all  their  efforts,  those 
who  light  this  fire  would  also  have  to  bear  the  conse- 
quences that  await  them.  The  vast  majority  of  Germans 
are  not  thinking  of  war  with  England,  and  indeed  do 
not  do  so  for  very  sober,  selfish  reasons.  We  have 
nothing  to  gain,  but  much  to  lose." 

This  war  scare  temporarily  died  down,  but  its  evil 

273 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

effects  remained,  j  The  rival  governments  went  on 
unrestrainedly  building-  navies  and  increasing  armies 
against  each  other,  and  from  this  year,  1908,  onward,  it 
became  more  and  more  difficult  to  contend  against  the 
fatalistic  expectations  of  war  which  had  been  created, 
alike  by  the  jingoism  of  the  press  and  by  the  European 
alliances  entered  into  by  Great  Britain  on  the  one  hand 
and  Germany  on  the  other.  We  drifted  into  war.  Few 
saw  the  tendency,  and  fewer  strove  to  stop  it.  When 
it  came,  the  scaremongers  who  made  it  hurried 
round  and  said  with  the  air  of  prophets  :  "We  told 
you  so." 

Meantime,  Hardie  was  once  more  on  the  high  seas, 
bound  for  Canada,  having  been  invited  by  the  leaders 
of  the  Dominion  Trade  Union  movement  to  attend  the 
Congress  in  Nova  Scoria,  on  September  2ist.  On  this 
occasion  he  was  accompanied  by  Mrs.  Hardie  and 
Agnes,  their  daughter.  He  had  also  for  ship  companion 
Mr.  Pels  of  America,  the  millionaire  disciple  of  Henry 
George,  with  whom  he  had  long  been  on  friendly  terms, 
and  would  fain  have  persuaded  to  accept  the  complete 
Socialist  conception  of  an  ideal  society.  There  is  nothing 
of  much  note  to  record  concerning  this  Transatlantic 
trip.  He  took  part  in  the  Congress  as  an  honoured 
guest,  and  endeavoured  to  convince  the  Canadians  of 
the  value  of  Labour  representation  as  a  means  of 
reconciling  elements  which  in  Canada  at  that  time  were 
irreconcilable.  He  augmented  his  stock  of  knowledge 
regarding  the  industrial  conditions  of  the  Dominion, 
and  crossed  over  into  the  United  States,  where  he 
gathered  impressions  of  the  Presidential  election  then 
taking  place,  the  Socialist  candidate  being  Eugene 
Debs,  who,  for  a  wonder,  was  not  in  prison.  But,  on 
the  whole,  it  was  more  of  a  pleasure  trip  than  was  usual 
with  him,  the  companionship  of  his  wife  and  daughter 

274 


FOREIGN  POLICY 

tending  to  save  him  from  the  propaganda  traps  lying  in 
wait  for  him  everywhere.  He  arrived  back  in  Glasgow 
on  October  nth,  and,  after  a  few  days  spent  at  Cum- 
nock,  was  in  London  in  time  to  take  part  in  the  welcome 
to  Kautsky  and  Ledebour  of  Germany  who  had  come 
on  the  invitation  of  the  British  section  of  the  Inter- 
national Bureau.  At  the  public  meeting  which  took 
place  in  the  St.  James's  Hall,  both  German  delegates 
deprecated  energetically  the  idea  of  war  between  the  two 
nations.  Kautsky  especially,  in  language  which  to-day 
reads  at  once  futile  and  prophetic,  declared  that  capi- 
talists themselves  would  be  opposed  to  war.  "Capitalism 
feared  war  to-day  because  it  knew  that  after  war  there 
would  be  revolution.  It  was  the  certainty  of  revolu- 
tion that  would  deter  the  exploiting  capitalists  of 
Europe  from  entering  upon  a  struggle  which  would  be 
death  to  capitalism  itself."  One  can  only  say,  alas ! 
alas  !  We  now  know  that  though  the  war  was  followed 
by  revolution,  the  fear  of  revolution  had  no  deterrent 
effect  upon  capitalism. 

•  Har die's  contribution  to  the  speech-making  was  ani^X 
impassioned  appeal  to  organised  labour  to  place  no 
faith  in  armies,  "whether  citizen  or  by  whatever  name 
they  might  be  called" — an  exhortation  which  imme- 
diately roused  the  ire  of  the  chairman,  Mr.  Hyndman, 
who,  as  we  know,  was  a  strong  supporter  of  the  citizen 
army  idea,  j  The  fact  that  there  were  these  divisions 
among  Btfash  Socialists  themselves,  detracted  largely 
from  the  value  of  this  meeting  as  an  influence  for  inter- 
national peace. 

Whilst  this  darkening  shadow  of  impending  inter- 
national war  was  slowly  gathering  and  filling  the  minds 
of  serious  men  with  ominous  forebodings,  there  was 
serious  enough  trouble  in  the  industrial  world  at  home. 
A  period  of  trade  depression  had  again  come  round — 

275 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

had  indeed  hardly  been  absent  for  several  years — and 
month  by  month  the  records  of  unemployment  went  on 
increasing,  accompanied  by  even  stronger  manifestations 
of  discontent  than  on  previous  occasions.  There  had 
been  disturbances  in  most  of  the  big  towns.  At  Glas- 
gow a  great  crowd  of  workless  men,  led  by  members  of 
the  I.L.P.,  themselves  unemployed,  had  stormed  the 
City  Council  Chambers  demanding  work,  and  from 
thence  had  marched  threateningly  into  the  West  End. 
At  Manchester  there  had  been  similar  scenes  and 
violent  conflicts  with  the  police,  resulting  in  arrests,  and 
in  several  persons  being  sentenced  to  long  terms  of 
imprisonment.  All  through  the  summer,  the  Parlia- 
mentary Labour  Party  had  been  pressing  the  Govern- 
ment to  give  the  financial  aid  which  alone  could  make 
the  Unemployment  Act  really  serviceable,  and  to  make 
the  Distress  Committee  powers  compulsory  instead  of 
permissive,  and  it  had  at  last  secured  the  promise  of  a 
statement  from  the  Government  as  to  its  intentions. 

On  the  day  following  that  on  which  this  promise  was 
made,  Mr.  Victor  Grayson  created  a  scene  in  the  House 
by  moving  the  adjournment,  his  expressed  desire  being 
"that  it  should  consider  a  matter  of  urgent  importance 
—the  question  of  unemployment."  and  on  being  told  by 
the  Speaker  that,  under  the  rules  of  the  House,  he 
could  not  move  the  adjournment  at  that  juncture,  he 
declared  that  he  refused  to  be  bound  by  the  rules. 
After  a  somewhat  lengthy  altercation  with  the  Speaker 
and  many  interjections  from  the  members,  he  withdrew 
from  the  House,  but  not  before  he  had  stigmatised  the 
Labour  Members  as  "traitors  to  their  class,  who  refuse 
to  stand  by  their  class."  The  following  day,  while  the 
House  was  in  Committee  on  the  Licensing  Bill,  a 
similar  scene  ensued,  which  ended  in  Grayson  being 
suspended. 

276 


INTERNAL  STRIFE 

Hardie's  view  of  the  matter  had  best  be  given  in  his 
own  words  :'  "Grayson  came  to  the  House  of  Commons1-"' 
on  Thursday,  but  spoke  to  no  one  of  his  intentions, 
consulted  no  one  and  did  not  even  intimate  that  he 
meant  to  make  a  scene.  That  may  be  his  idea  of  comrade- 
ship; it  is  not  mine.^f  Nor  is  it  what  the  I.L.P.  will 
tolerate  from  one  of  its  members.  If  the  Labour  Party, 
or  if  the  I.L.P.  members,  had  been  invited  to  take  part 
in  a  protest  and  had  refused,  then  Grayson's  action 
might  have  been  justifiable,  but  acting  as  he  did,  no 
other  result,  could  be  expected  than  that  which 
happened.  4  If  a  protest  is  to  be  made,  it  must  be  done 
unitedly,  and  in  a  manner  to  command  respect."  J 

Hardie,  as  we  know,  had  no  reverential  regard  for 
the  rules  of  the  House — though  he  had  known  how  to 
make  use  of  them  for  his  own  purposes,  but  he  had  very 
great  regard  for  the  prestige  of  trie  Labour  Party  in  the 
House  and  in  the  country.  He,  of  all  men,  could  not 
be  accused  of  indifference  to  the  claims  of  the  unem- 
ployed. What  legislation  on  their  behalf  did  exist  was 
mainly  the  outcome  of  his  efforts  at  a  time  when  he 
stood  alone.  But  now  that  there  was  a  Labour  Party 
in  the  House,  he  held  that  upon  that  Party  rested  the 
responsibility  of  forcing  the  hands  of  the  Government, 
and  that  isolated  action  by  one  individual  could  only 
have  a  disruptive  effect  upon  the  Socialist  movement 
without  being  helpful  to  the  unemployed. 

There  was,  moreover,  some  reason  to  believe  that  the 
Grayson  histrionics  were  deliberately  intended  to  pro- 
duce the  disruption  deprecated  by  Hardie,  and  an 
incident  which  occurred  outside  the  House,  almost 
immediately  after,  seemed  to  verify  that  belief .[  Grayson 
and  Hyndman  refused  to  appear  on  the  same^platform  ~ 
as  Hardie  at  a  public  meeting  under  the  auspices  of 
the  Clarion  Van  Committee,  a  body  existing  for  the 

T  277 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

purpose  of  promoting  the  Clarion  Van  propaganda 
carried  on  in  connection  with  Blatchford's  paper. 
Hardie,  Hyndman  and  Grayson  had  been  invited  by  the 
Committee  to  speak  at  demonstrations  in  the  Hoiborn 
and  Finsbury  Town  Halls.  Hardie  had  agreed  to  do 
so  and  was  much  surprised  to  receive  a  letter  from  the 
secretary  on  the  day  previous  to  the  meetings,  request- 
ing him  to  "refrain  from  attending  the  meetings,"  the 
reason  given  being  that  Hyndman  and  Grayson  were 
unable  to  join  with  him  as  speakers. 

That  this  extraordinary  and  insulting  attitude  towards 
the  greatest  of  all  working-class  agitators  was  the  out- 
come of  something  more  than  mere  personal  pettiness 
was  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  the  "Clarion"  was  at 
this  time  devoting  its  columns  to  the  promulgation  of  a 
new  Socialist  Party,  with  the  Clarion  Scouts  and  the 
Clarion  Fellowship  as  the  nucleus,  and  dissentient 
I.L.P.  members  as  potential  recruits;  whilst  Hyndman 
justified  his  action  by  reference  to  Hardie' s  anti-war 
scare  article,  and  to  his  attack  on  a  citizen  army  at  the 
reception  to  the  German  delegation.  The  best  comment 
upon  this  disgraceful  episode  was  supplied  by  an  un- 
solicited letter  to  the  "Labour  Leader"  from  M.  Beer, 
London  correspondent  of  "Vorwarts,"  whose  recently 
published  "History  of  British  Socialism"  is  recognised 
as  the  standard  authority  on  the  subject.  Beer  had 
dissented  strongly  from  Hardie's  views  at  the  time  of 
the  class-war  discussion,  and  his  support  of  Hardie 
now  was  therefore  all  the  more  valuable.  The  letter 
has  both  biographical  and  historical  interest,  and  is 
therefore  reproduced  here  intact.  As  an  exposition  of 
the  practical  philosophy  of  the  British  Labour  Party 
movement  from  the  point  of  view  of  a  Marxian  dis- 
ciple it  is  worth  considering  at  the  present  time.  The 
letter  was  as  follows  : — 

278 


INTERNAL  STRIFE 

"To  the  Editor  of  the  'Labour  Leader/ 

"Comrade, — Kindly  permit  me  to  express,  first  of  all, 
my  sincere  and  respectful  sympathy  for  Keir  Hardie 
with  regard  to  the  deplorable  Holborn  Town  Hall  inci- 
dent. As  a  close  observer  of  the  British  Labour  move- 
ment, I  regard  the  work  of  Keir  Hardie  to  be  of  much 
more  permanent  value  than  that  of  Hyndman,  Shaw, 
Blatchford,  Wells,  let  alone  Grayson.  Of  all  British 
Socialists  none,  in  my  judgment,  has  grasped  the  essence 
of  modern  Socialism — aye,  of  Marxism — better  than 
Hardie.  Moreover,  none  has  done  in  practice  better 
work  than  Hardie.  His  silent,  clear-headed  and  con- 
sistent efforts  in  the  first  years  of  the  L.R.C.  on  behalf 
of  the  unity  and  independence  of  organised  Labour, 
would  alone  be  sufficient  to  raise  him  to  the  front  rank 
of  Socialist  statesmanship.  For  what  is  the  essence  of 
modern  Socialism  as  Marx  taught  it? — The  political 
independence  of  Labour.  And  what  is  the  foremost 
duty  of  a  Socialist  in  the  class  struggle? — To  divorce 
Labour  from  the  parties  of  the  possessing  class.  All 
that  Keir  Hardie  has  done,  more  by  virtue  of  a  practi- 
cally unerring  proletarian  instinct  than  by  theorising 
and  speculating  about  revolution  and  so-called  con- 
structive Socialism.  Socialism  is  not  made,  but  it  is 
growing  out  of  the  needs  and  struggles  of  organised 
Labour.  The  most  simple  Labour  organisation,  fighting 
for  high  wages,  shorter  hours  and  better  Labour  laws, 
does  more  for  Socialism  than  all  the  Utopian  books  of 
Wells,  all  the  Swiftean  wit  of  Shaw,  all  the  revolution- 
ary speeches  of  Hyndman,  and  all  the  sentimental 
harangues  of  Grayson.  I  have  been  saying  that  for 
years  in  the  'Vorwarts,'  in  the  'Neue  Zeit/  and  some- 
times in  'Justice.'  And  now  let  me  make  a  confession. 
Soon  after  the  election  of  Grayson,  my  editor  asked 
me  whether  I  did  not  think  it  advisable  to  interview 

279 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

Gray  son  for  the  'Vorwarts.'  I  replied  it  would  be 
better  to  wait;  the  British  Socialists,  with  their  wonted 
hero-worship,  were  already  spoiling  him;  there  would 
be  a  meeting  at  the  Caxton  Hall  (in  September,  1907), 
when  Grayson  was  to  speak.  I  should  then  have  an 
opportunity  of  arriving  at  some  judgment  about  him. 
The  meeting  took  place,  MacDonald  being  the  chair- 
man, Curran  and  Grayson  the  chief  speakers.  After  that 
meeting,  of  which  I  gave  a  report  in  the  'Vorwarts,'  I 
wrote  about  Grayson.  'He  is  very  self-conscious;  his 
Socialism  consists  of  commiseration  with  the  poor;  in 
his  speech  he  didn't  mention  the  Labour  movement  at 
all.  Now,  modern  Socialism  has  very  little  to  do  with 
poor  men  stories  but  a  great  deal  with  organised  Labour. 
Grayson  has  still  much  to  learn  about  Socialism  and  he 
may  learn  it  if  he  remains  in  close  touch  with  the  Labour 
Party.'  ('Vorwarts,'  September,  1907.)  In  approving 
wholeheartedly  of  the  policy  of  Hardie,  I  also  approve 
of  the  general  policy  of  J.  R.  MacDonald.  At  the  pub- 
lication of  his  'Socialism  and  Society'  he  had  no  severer 
critic  than  myself,  because  I  suspected  him  of  attempt- 
ing to  weaken  the  independence  of  the  Labour  Party.  I 
still  consider  him  what  the  Germans  call  a  'Revisionist,' 
but  at  the  same  time  I  cannot  help  perceiving  that  his 
general  policy  is  at  present  thoroughly  in  conformity 
with  the  mental  condition  of  the  British  Labour  move- 
ment. Any  other  policy  might  at  the  present  juncture 
spell  disruption.  We  can't  force  movements  of 
oppressed  classes.  We  must  allow  them  to  develop  and 
to  ripen.  'Ripeness  is  all.' — Fraternally  yours, 

"M.  BEER, 
"London,  November  22nd,  1908." 

It  should  be  said  that  this  letter  was  followed  by 
one  from  H.  G.  Wells  protesting  against  being  "lumped 

280 


INTERNAL  STRIFE 

with  Hyndman,  Shaw,  Blatchford  and  Grayson,  as 
being  opposed  to  the  work  of  Hardie,"  and  viewing  "with 
infinite  disgust  the  deplorable  attacks  upon  the  I.L.P. 
leaders."  These  attacks  upon  Hardie  had  the  usual 
effect  of  strengthening  the  loyalty  of  the  I.L.P.  rank 
and  file  who,  through  their  branch  secretaries,  literally 
bombarded  him  with  assurances  of  esteem  and 
confidence. 

Amid  it  all,  he  went  on  with  his  work,  and  in  the  same 
issue  of  the  "Leader"  in  which  Beer's  appreciation 
appeared,  he  had  an  appeal  to  the  local  education 
authorities  to  give  effect  to  the  Provision  of  Meals  for 
Children  Act  and  reminded  them  that  they  possessed 
powers  to  supply  each  scholar  in  every  public  school 
with  two  or  three  substantial  meals  each  day.  "I  have 
frequently,"  he  said,  "had  occasion  to  point  out  that  if 
in  this  and  other  respects  the  existing  law  were  put  into 
operation  the  hardships  and  suffering  due  to  unemploy- 
ment would  be  mitigated." 

There  never  was  a  more  practical  idealist  than  J.  Keir 
Hardie.  fBy  blocking  a  North  British  Railway  Bill,  he, 
compelled  that  company  to  withdraw  its  dismissal  of  a 
number  of  its  employees  who  had  been  elected  as  Town 
Councillors,  and  in  December  he  introduced  an  "Emer- 
gency Unemployment  Bill"  to  enable  Distress  Commit- 
tees to  use  the  penny  rate  levy  for  the  payment  of  wages, 
and  to  provide  for  special  Committees  where  no  Dis- 
tress Committee  was  in  existencef]  His  object  was  to 
make  the  present  Act  workable  during  the  winter, 
pending  the  promised  Government  measure.  He  also 
protested  strongly  against  the  mutilation  by  the  House 
of  Lords  of  the  Miners'  Eight  Hours'  Day  Bill,  but  as 
the  Miners'  Federation  had  agreed  to  accept  the  amend- 
ments rather  than  lose  the  Bill  altogether,  he  had  to  waive 
his  objections.  Every  hour  of  his  waking  time  seemed 

281 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

to  be  filled  with  work.  "I  envy  the  editor  of  the 
'Clarion/  "  he  wrote,  "the  quiet  day  at  home  in  which 
to  write  his  article  on  the  political  situation.  Some  of 
us  are  nomads  and  vagrants  all  the  time,  and  have  to 
write  as  odd  moments  offer,  in  the  midst  of  many  other 
and  divers  duties." 

In  proof  of  this,  he  appended  his  week's  diary  of 
work,  which  included  attendance  and  speech-making  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  six  hours'  sitting  on  the 
"Coal  Mines  Eight  Hours'  Bill  Committee,"  a  "Right 
to  Work  Executive"  meeting,  a  "Labour  Party"  meet- 
ing, a  conference  with  French  workmen  delegates,  an 
I.L.P.  Parliamentary  Committee  meeting,  a  week- 
end public  meeting  at  Halifax,  besides  correspondence 
entailing  over  a  hundred  replies  to  personal  letters. 
Hardie  did  not  really  envy  Blatchford  his  life  of  leisured 
journalism,  but  he  resented  strongly  the  habitual 
assumption  of  pontifical  authority  on  working-class 
questions  by  one  who  had  no  practical  connection  with 
the  working  class,  who  did  not  participate  in  any  of  the 
drudgery  inseparable  from  the  work  of  labour  organisa- 
tion, who  was  not  in  a  position  to  understand  working- 
class  psychology,  and  who  held  himself  safely  aloof 
from  all  official  responsibility.  Hardie  was  amongst 
the  workers  every  day.  He  knew  every  phase  of  work- 
ing-class life,  not  only  that  of  the  toiling  underground 
collier,  but  of  the  skilled  artisan,  the  sweated  labourer, 
the  under-paid  woman.  His  life  purpose  was  to  make 
the  working  class  united  and  powerful,  and  conscious 
of  its  power;  and  he  believed  he  knew  better  than 
Hyndman  and  Blatchford  t{ie  methods  whereby  that 
purpose  could  be  achieved.  [  It  had  been  no  easy  task 
to  call  the  Labour  Party  into  being,  and  he  was  cer- 
tainly not  going  to  allow  it  to  be  destroyed  by  the 
subversive  and  divisive  tactics  which  were  now  being 

282 


INTERNAL  STRIFE 

used.  New  parties  might  be  .formed  bearing  all  manner 
of  names,  but  the  Labour  Party  would  remain  and 
be  moulded  towards  Socialism  by  the  I.L.P.  as  long  as 
the  breath  of  life  remained  in  the  founder  of  both 
organisations. 

'The  climax  came  at  the  1909  Conference  of  the  I.L.P. 
held  at  Edinburgh.  At  this  Conference,  a  proposal 
that  the  I.L.P.  should  sever  itself  from  the  Labour 
Party  found  only  eight  supporters  against  three  hundred 
and  seventy-eight  in  favour  of  "maintaining  unimpaired 
the  alliance  of  Labour  and  Socialism  as  affording  the 
best  means  for  the  expression  of  Socialism  to-day/'  A 
further  resolution  declaring  that  "no  salary  be  paid  to 
Members  of  Parliament  unless  such  Members  sign  the 
Labour  Party  constitution"  was  adopted  by  352  votes 
to  64.  Thus  was  reaffirmed  with  emphasis  the  funda- 
mental principles  of  the  Labour  Party  alliance.  It  was 
otherwise  when  the  same  principle  reappeared  in  a  form 
involving  the  discussion  of  Grayson' s  conduct  outside 
the  House  of  Commons. 

A  paragraph  in  the  N.A.C.  report  explained  the 
reasons  why  that  body  had  ceased  to  arrange  meetings 
for  Grayson.  They  were  that  he  had  failed  to  fulfil 
engagements  already  made,  and  that  his  refusal  to 
appear  with  Hardie  on  the  Holborn  Town  Hall  plat- 
form made  it  useless  to  fix  up  meetings  for  him 
through  the  Head  Office.  On  the  motion  of  Grayson 
himself,  this  paragraph  was  "referred  back" — that  is  to 
say,  deleted  from  the  Report — by  217  to  194  votes. 
This  could  only  be  interpreted  as  an  approval  of  Gray- 
,^on's  action,  and  of  the  motives  which  had  actuated  it. 
Hardie,  Glasier,  Snowden  and  MacDonald  so  inter- 
preted it,  and  resigned  from  the  N.A.C.  to  which  they 
had  just  been  re-elected  by  large  majorities,  Hardie, 
as  usual,  being  at  the  top  of  the  poll — a  paradoxical 

283 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

state  of  matters  which  evinced  considerable  mental 
confusion  on  the  part  of  the  delegates.  The  resigna- 
tions were  announced  by  MacDonald,  who  was  chair- 
man, in  a  firm  speech  in  which  he  declared  that  he  and 
his  three  colleagues  declined  to  associate  themselves 
with  the  growth  of  what  seemed  to  them  an  impossiblist 
movement  within  the  Party,  with  its  spirit  of  irresponsi- 
bility, its  modes  of  expression,  and  its  methods  of 
bringing  Socialism;  and  he  affirmed  that  it  was  not  the 
mere  reference  back  of  the  paragraph  which  made  them 
take  that  action,  but  the  source  and  antecedents  of  that 
event.  The  Conference,  thus  brought  to  face  the  impli- 
cations of  its  censuring  decision,  quickly  realised  its 
mistake,  and  with  only  ten  dissentients,  passed  the 
following  resolution,  which  was,  of  course,  equivalent 
to  a  rescinding  of  the  Grayson  motion  :  : '  That  this 
Conference  hears  with  regret  the  statement  made  on 
behalf  of  the  outgoing  National  Administrative  Council, 
and  desires  to  express  its  emphatic  endorsement  of 
their  past  policy,  and  its  emphatic  confidence,  personal 
and  political,  in  Messrs.  MacDonald,  Keir  Hardie, 
Bruce  Glasier,  and  Snowden,  and  most  earnestly 
requests  them  to  withdraw  their  resignation."  This 
the  four  members  declined  to  do;  Hardie,  who  spoke 
with  strong  feeling,  declaring  that  they  had  been 
regarded  as  limpets  clinging  to  office,  and  that 
members  present  and  a  section  of  the  Socialist  press 
had  put  forward  that  statement.  The  trouble  with 
Grayson  was  that  success  had  come  to  him  too  easily, 
and  he  was  surrounded  by  malign  influences  that  would 
ruin  his  career — a  prediction  that  was  unfortunately 
amply  fufilled.  Grayson,  Hyndman  and  Blatchford 
had  refused  to  appear  on  the  same  platform  with  him, 
and  it  had  gone  abroad  that  he  had  lost  the  confidence 
of  the  movement.  Self-respect  demanded  that  a  stand 

284 


INTERNAL   STRIFE 

should  be  made.  He  valued  the  opinion  expressed  by 
the  Conference.  He  would  like  it  sent  down  to  the 
branches,  especially  to  those  where  there  was  that  small, 
snarling,  semi-disruptive  element.  They  must  fight 
that  down,  and  if  need  be  fight  it  out.  With  his  col- 
leagues he  was  going  to  test  the  question  whether  the 
I.L.P.  was  to  stand  for  the  consolidation  of  the  working- 
class  movement,  or  whether,  departing  from  the  lines 
of  sanity,  they  should  follow  some  chimera  called 
Socialism  and  Unity  spoken  of  by  men  who  did  not 
understand  Socialism  and  were  alien  to  its  very 

spirit. 

Thus,  in  the  sixteenth  year  of  the  I.L.P.,  its  founder 
ceased  to  be  a  member  of  its  executive,  and  with  him  ^ 
the  three  men  most  representative  to  the  public  mind  of 
the  spirit  and  policy  of  the  Party.  Of  the  four,  Glasier 
was  the  only  one  who  was  not  a  Member  of  Parliament, 
but  he  was  editor  of  the  " Labour  Leader/'  which 
expressed  the  policy  of  the  Party.  During  his  four-and- 
a-half  years  of  editorship,  the  circulation  had  increased 
from  13,000  to  40,000,  but,  nevertheless,  his  editorial 
conduct  had  been  severely  and  unfairly  criticised 
during  this  Conference  from  the  same  sources  which 
had  promoted  the  disruptive  tactics,  and  in  addition  to 
resigning  from  the  N.A.C.  he  announced  his  intention 
of  ceasing  to  be  editor  as  soon  as  another  could  be  found 
to.take  his  place. 

Superficially,  it  seemed  as  if  the  designs  of  the 
enemies  of  the  I.L.P.  had  been  accomplished,  and  that 
the  Party  had  been  rent  in  twain.  Those  who  thought 
so  knew  little  of  the  I.L.P.  or  of  the  men  who  had 
resigned  from  office  in  order  to  meet  disaffection  in  the 
branches.  The  influence  of  the  four  retiring  men  had 
increased  rather  than  diminished.  The  work  of  the 
I.L.P.  lay,  where  it  has  always  been";  in  the  country,  and 

285 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

the  branches  continued  to  do  the  work  with  an  energy 
that  this  internal  strife  only  stimulated. 
/  I  Eight  months  later  came  the  General  Election,  with 
the  I.L.P.  and  Labour  Party  candidates  in  the  field 
working  together,  and  the  membership  unitedly  behind 
them,  fighting  for  Socialism  and  for  working-class 
political  power.  The  efforts  to  disintegrate  the  Labour 
movement  had  failed. J 

In  the  months  prior  to  the  General  Election  there 
occurred  opportunities  of  a  kind  to  test  the  moral 
courage  of  the  Parliamentary  Labour  Party  and  demon- 
strate the  need  for  the  existence  of  such  a  Party.  The 
most  outstanding  of  these  was  the  visit  of  the  Czar  to 
this  country  and  his  official  reception  by  the  Government 
at  Cowes.  The  significance  of  this  would  have  passed 
almost  unnoticed  but  for  the  protest  of  the  Labour 
Party,  so  much  at  one  were  the  Liberals  and  Tories  on 
the  question  of  foreign  policy.  On  July  22nd,  on  the 
Civil  Service  vote,  Arthur  Henderson,  as  leader  of  the 
Labour  Party,  delivered  a  strong  speech  denunciatory 
of  the  Government's  action  as  being  in  effect  a  condone- 
ment  of  the  crimes  of  the  Czar  and  his  Government 
against  the  common  people  of  Russia.  His  recital  of 
those  crimes  drew  from  Sir  Edward  Grey  the  memorable 
and  immoral  declaration  that  "it  is  not  our  business 
even  to  know  what  passes  in  the  internal  affairs  of 
other  countries  where  we  have  no  treaty  rights,"  an 
avowal  which  Hardie,  who  followed,  had  no  difficulty 
in  proving  to  be  without  either  historical  or  political 
vindication,  by  recalling  the  action  of  Mr.  Gladstone 
with  regard  to  the  internal  affairs  of  Naples  and  the 
tyranny  of  King  Bomba,  and  also  the  more  recent 
interventions  in  the  matter  of  the  Congo  and  of  Armenia. 
This  was  one  of  the  finest  utterances  Hardie  ever  made 
i :,  in  the  House  of  Commons.  ?  In  his  closing  words  he 

286 


FOREIGN    POLICY 

appealed  for  a  clear  vote  of  the  House  on  this  subject 
of  the  Czar,  as  apart  from  the  general  discussion  which 
had  included  other  topics.  -"It  was  because  he  belonged 
to  a  Party  whose  whole  sympathies  were  with  the  people 
of  Russia  in  the  great  fight  which  they  were  making, 
and  because  he  knew  that  every  section  of  the  advanced 
movement  in  Russia,  from  the  extreme  Socialist  to  the 
mildest  Liberal,  regarded  the  visit  of  the  Czar  to  this 
country  as,  to  some  extent,  throwing  back  their  cause 
by  giving  him  the  official  recognition  of  a  great  demo- 
cratic State,  that  he,  and  those  with  him,  opposed  the 
visit." 

This  protest,  which  was  re-echoed  from  every  Labour 
platform  in  the  country,  had  its  effect.  Not  only  did  it 
wash  the  hands  of  British  organised  labour  from  the 
blood-guiltiness  involved  in  the  Russian  alliance  and 
left  the  Party  free  to  oppose  the  development  of  the 
policy  which  that  alliance  implied,  but,  as  a  result,  the 
Czar  remained  on  board  his  yacht  at  Cowes  and  did  not 
set  foot  on  English  soil.  It  is  true  to  say  that  at  the 
forging  of  every  link  which  bound  Britain  to  Imperialist 
Russia  in  a  common  policy,  the  Labour  Party  made  an 
effort  to  prevent  the  chain  from  being  completed ;  and 
it  is  also  true  to  say  that  this  was  mainly  due  to  the 
influence  of  the  I.L.P.  within  the  Labour  Party,  seeking 
thereby  to  perform  its  duty  as  a  part  of  the  International 
Socialist  movement. 

And  not  only  with  regard  to  Russia  did  the  Labour 
Party  maintain  this  attitude  of  sympathy  with  the 
oppressed,  but  with  regard  to  every  land  whose  affairs 
came  in  any  way  under  the  cognisance  of  the  British 
Parliament.  It  championed  the  claims  of  the  South 
African  natives  during  the  passage  of  the  Draft  Con- 
stitution of  the  South  African  Union;  it  protested  by 
speech  and  vote  against  the  suppression  of  civil  liberty 

287 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

and  the  right  of  free  speech  in  India;  it  supported  the 
Irish  Nationalists  in  their  claims  for  Home  Rule  and 
joined  hands  with  the  Egyptian  people  in  their  demands 
for  the  establishment  of  their  long  withheld  national 
independence.  On  foreign  and  colonial  policy  the 
Labour  Party  was,  in  fact,  at  this  time,  the  only  Parlia- 
mentary Opposition,  and  the  only  source  from  which 
emanated  any  virile  criticism. 

In  all  this  work  Hardie  was  bearing  a  very  large 
share,  not  .only  in  Parliament,  but  in  the  country  and  in 
the  world,  firms,  for  example,  we  find  him  with  George 
N.  Barnes,  representing  the  Labour  Party  at  the  Annual 
Conference  of  the  Young  Egyptian  Party  at  Geneva, 
and  hailed  there  as  a  valued  friend  and  counsellor. 
One  passage  of  his  speech  on  that  occasion  should  be 
preserved,  if  for  no  other  reason  than  that  it  is  in  direct 
contrast  to  the  conception  of  him  prevalent  in  some 
quarters  as  an  irresponsible  firebrand  and  mischief 
maker.  "Beware,"  he  said,  "of  secret  organisation  and 
of  all  thoughts  of  an  armed  rising  for  the  overthrow  of 
British  authority.  Every  patriotic  movement  which 
indulges  in  secret  forms  of  organisation  places  itself  in 
the  power  of  the  Government.  Such  organisations  are 
sure  to  be  honeycombed  by  spies  and  traitors.  The 
experience  of  Ireland  in  former  times,  and  of  Russia  at 
present,  is  all  the  proof  needed  on  this  score.  Work 
openly  and  in  the  light  of  day  for  the  creation  of  public 
opinion  in  Egypt  and  Great  Britain,  and  have  no  fear 
of  the  result." 

With  this  wide  outlook  upon  the  progress  of  demo- 
cracy throughout  the  world,  it  is  not  surprising  that 
abstract  contentions  about  Socialist  dogma  sometimes 
seemed  to  him  irrelevant  and  trivial,  and  the  intrigues 
within  the  Labour  and  Socialist  movement,  petty  and 
vexatious. 

288 


WOMEN 

Nor  must  it  be  forgotten  that  all  this  time  the  Women's 
Suffrage  movement  was  becoming  more  violently  militant 
in  its  tactics,  breaking  up  meetings  of  friends  and  foes 
alike,  and  acting  generally  on  the  principle  that  every 
other  cause  must  stand  still  until  the  women's  claims 
had  been  conceded.  The  women  themselves  were  con- 
sistent and  courageous  in  carrying  through  this  policy, 
and  nearly  all  the  time  there  were  numbers  of  them 
suffering  imprisonment.  To  Hardie  and  Snowden 
they  looked  chiefly  to  champion  their  cause  in  Parlia- 
ment and  exploit  their  martyrdoms  for  propaganda 
purposes,  and  it  is  to  be  feared  that  they  did  not  reflect 
that  while  harassing  the  Government  they  were  also 
harassing  their  best  friends  and  putting  a  serious  strain 
upon  physiques  already  overwrought.  Nor  was  this  all. 
Miss  Mary  Macarthur,  of  the  Federation  of  Women 
Workers,  has  told  us  how,  in  the  midst  of  her  work  of 
organising  the  underpaid  and  sorely  sweated  women  of 
East  London,  Hardie  was  the  one  Labour  Member 
upon  whom  she  could  always  rely  to  come  down  and 
speak  words  of  sympathy  and  encouragement  to  those 
victims  of  commercialism. 

He  responded  to  every  call,  and  never  counted  the 
cost  to  himself,  and  when  occasionally  he  ran  off  for  a 
brief  spell  of  rest  it  was  an  extremely  wearied,  though 
undaunted  man,  whom  his  friends  among  the  Welsh 
hills  welcomed  to  their  firesides. 


289 


CHAPTER  TWELVE 

TWO     GENERAL     ELECTIONS INDUSTRIAL     TURMOIL THE 

BRINK  OF  WAR 

IN  the  two  general  elections  of  1910,  the  man  in  the 
limelight  was  Mr.  Lloyd  George  who  has  managed 
to  retain  that  position  fairly  continuously  ever  since, 
though  he  has  long  ago  made  friends  of  his  whilom 
enemies,  and  has  thrust  aside  the  semi-revolutionary 
ladder  by  which  he  rose  to  fame  and  power.  The  agita- 
tions over  the  land  taxation  budget  and  House  of  Lords' 
reforms  seem  now  very  remote,  and  in  view  of  recent 
jugglings  with  national  finance  extremely  futile.  But 
at  the  time  I  have  now  reached,  it  was  an  exceedingly 
noisy  agitation  and  apparently  sincere.  Mr.  George, 
with  his  lurid  hen-roost  oratory,  and  the  peers,  with 
their  die-in-the-last-ditch  constitutionalism,  had,  be- 
tween them,  created  a  decidely  class-war  atmosphere, 
and  there  were  timid  people  who  actually  believed  that 
the  nation  was  on  the  eve  of  great  events  foreshadowing, 
in  the  words  of  Lord  Rosebery,  the  "end  of  all  things." 
The  Labour  Party  in  Parliament  had  naturally 
supported  the  land  taxation  proposals  and  also  those  for 
a  super-tax  on  incomes,  but  only  as  initial  concessions  to 
the  Socialist  claim  that  all  unearned  increment  should 
belong  to  the  nation.  Philip  Snowden,  now  the  recog- 
nised exponent  of  Socialist  finance,  made  this  unmis- 
takably clear  in  a  series  of  brilliant  speeches  at  various 
stages  of  the  Finance  Bill.  On  the  question  of  the 
v  House  of  Lords,  the  Labour  Party  stood  for  the 

290 


GENERAL   ELECTION 

abolition  of  that  institution,  but,  as  a  matter  of  practical 
politics  supported  any  proposal  having  for  its  object  the 
immediate  limitation  of  the  power  of  the  second  Cham- 
ber. The  Labour  and  the  Liberal  Parties  were  thus, 
though  in  principle  far  apart  as  the  poles,  in  apparent 
accord  on  electoral  policy — a  state  of  matters  not  to  the 
advantage  of  Labour.  The  strategical  weakness  of  the 
Liberals  lay  in  the  fact  that  they  had  not,  and  could  not 
have,  any  policy  on  unemployment  to  counter  the 
attractive  and  strongly  boomed  Tariff  Reform  proposals 
of  the  Unionists. 

In  the  election  which  took  place  in  January,  1910,  the 
Liberals  lost  one  hundred  seats  and  the  Labour  Party 
lost  five.  All  the  leading  Labour  men,  however,  held 
their  seats,  Hardie  keeping  his  by  a  greatly  increased 
majority,  though  on  this  occasion  he  had  a  second 
Liberal  opponent,  in  the  person  of  Pritchard  Morgan, 
whom  he  had  defeated  in  1900,  and  who  now,  as  if 
determined  on  revenge,  conducted  the  usual  campaign 
of  scurrilous  abuse  and  misrepresentation.  .  One  very 
special  lie  circulated  assiduously  and  insidiously,  though 
not  in  print,  represented  Hardie  as  being  a  man  of 
wealth,  who  owned  an  estate  in  Scotland  and  h,ad  sold 
the  "Labour  Leader"  to  the  I.L.P.  for  £20,000.  Up  to 
the  last  there  were  credulous  people  who  believed  these 
stupid  stories  and  pestered  him  for  subscriptions  to 
various  kinds  of  ostensibly  charitable  objects.  He,  as 
a  matter  of  fact,  had  refused  to  subscribe  to  local  insti- 
tutions such  as  football  clubs  and  bowling  clubs,  for  the 
sufficient  reason  that  over  and  above  his  objections  on 
principle,  he  had  hardly  enough  income  to  meet  the 
frugal  requirements  of  his  own  household.  The  elec- 
tion campaign  on  this  occasion  was  more  prolonged  and 
even  more  strenuous  than  the  two  previous  ones,  but 
need  not  be  described  here.  The  result  seemed  to  carry 

t 

291 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

with  it  the  assurance  that  his  position  in  Merthyr  was 
absolutely  impregnable.  He  had  polled  13,841  votes 
as  compared  with  10,187  in  1906,  and  his  majority  had 
increased  from  2,411  to  9,105. 

An  extract  from  his  election  address  may  be  given 
as  showing  with  what  skill  he  raised  the  contest  above 
merely  temporary  or  local  controversies.  ;' There  are 
issues  that  go  deeper  than  any  of  those  raised  by  the 
traditional  parties  in  this  contest.  Mr.  Balfour  has  said 
that  he  wants  this  election  fought  on  the  issues  of 
Socialism  and  Tariff  Reform.  I  accept  Mr.  Balfour's 
challenge,  and  put  my  Socialism  against  his  Tariff 
Reform.  He  wants  to  use  the  State  for  the  benefit  of 
the  rich.  I  want  to  use  it  for  the  benefit  of  all,LSocialism 
;  is  the  one  system  whereby  man  may  escape  from  the 
dreary  labyrinth  of  poverty,  vice  and  beggarliness  in 
life  in  which  the  race  is  now  aimlessly  wandering/^ 

He  himself  attributed  his  electoral  success  to  the  fact 
that  Socialism  had  been  made  the  supreme  issue,  and  the 
following  February,  in  his  closing  words  as  chairman 
of  the  Labour  Party  Conference,  he  affirmed  adherence 
to  that  principle  to  be  a  necessary  condition  of  success 
for  the  entire  Labour  Party.  "Whether  we  like  it  or 
not,  in  every  contest  we  wage,  our  opponents  will  see 
to  it  that  Socialism  is  kept  well  to  the  front.  Our  can- 
didates and  workers  will  therefore  do  well  to  equip 
themselves  for  that  line  of  attack.  Socialism  has  no 
terrors  for  honest  people.  The  caricatures  and  vile  mis- 
representation of  Socialism  fail  entirely  when  the  case 
for  Socialism  is  put  lucidly  before  the  people.  We  do 
not  want  to  see  any  vain  beating  of  the  air  as  is  too 
often  done  in  the  name  of  Socialism,  but  it  is  imperative 
that  every  man  who  is  put  forward  as  a  candidate  under 
Labour  auspices  should  be  able  to  defend  and  expound 
Socialism  when  it  is  attacked  by  the  enemies  of  Labour." 

292 


FOREIGN   AFFAIRS 

It  must  be  confessed  that  there  have  been,  and  still  are, 
many  Labour  candidates  whose  qualifications  do  not 
conform  to  the  standard  set  up  by  the  founder  of  the 
Labour  Party. 

ijin  passing,  it  should  be  noted  that  this  year  the 
British  Miners'  Federation  became  affiliated  to  the 
Labour  Party,  and  thus  another  decisive  step  was  taken 
in  the  political  consolidation  of  the  working  class,  'j 

All  through  the  year  the  great  constitutional  contro- 
versy continued,  and  the  people  became  so  deeply 
engrossed  shouting  for  or  against  Lloyd  George  that 
they  forgot  all  about  Sir  Edward  Grey,  a  much  more 
fateful  statesman  if  they  had  only  known  it. 

The  rival  partisans  debated  hotly  as  to  whether  the 
House  of  Lords  should  be  ended  or  mended,  as  to  how 
many  new  peers  it  would  be  necessary  to  create  to 
render  that  House  impotent,  or  as  to  how  many  times 
a  reformed  Second  Chamber  should  be  allowed  to  throw 
out  a  Bill  before  it  became  law ;  and  while  this  political 
comedy  of  "much  ado  about  next  to  nothing"  was  pro- 
ceeding, the  diplomats  and  the  Imperialists  were  not  idle. 
Lord  Roberts  continued  his  propaganda  for  compul- 
sory military  service,  the  introduction  of  which  the  War 
Office  partially  anticipated  by  encouraging  railway  com- 
panies and  large  employers  of  labour  to  make  service 
in  the  Territorial  forces  a  condition  of  employment. 
Mr.  Haldane's  "nation  in  arms"  was  materialising  in 
spite  of  protests  from  Hardie  and  his  colleagues.  The 
Admiralty  was  getting  its  Dreadnoughts  built.  Germany 
was  adding  to  its  fleet.  France  was  raising  the  peace- 
time strength  of  its  army,  and,  more  fateful  than  all, 
British  and  French  financiers  were  investing  their 
millions  in  Russia,  and  staking  out  concessions  of 
industrially  exploitable  territory  in  that  unhappy  Czar- 
ridden  country.  In  the  midst  of  the  evolution  of  a  policy 

U  293 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

in  which  he  took  special  interest  and  played  a  prominent 
part,  King  Edward  died.  His  successor  was  enthroned. 
Liberals  and  Tories  called  a  temporary  truce.  They 
mingled  their  tears  for  the  dead  monarch,  combined 
their  cheers  for  the  living  one,  and  then  went  on  with 
the  farce,  "The  Peers  versus  the  People." 

One  tragic  interlude  there  was,  turning  public  atten- 
tion for  a  few  brief  hours  to  the  realities  of  industrial 
life.  This  was  the  Whitehaven  disaster.  Following  close 
/  upon  the  death  of  King  Edward  camethe  death  of  one 
^  hundred  and  thirty  working  miners  under  appalling  and, 
as  many  people  believed,  preventable  circumstances; 
repeated  recommendations  by  special  scientific  investi- 
gators for  the  minimising  of  risks  of  explosions  in  mines 
having  been  ignored  alike  by  the  Home  Office  and  by 
the  mineowners  chiefly  because  of  the  expense.  The 
feeling  raised  amongst  the  mining  community  by  the 
Whitehaven  disaster  was,  if  anything,  intensified  by 
what  many  of  them  regarded  as  the  too  hasty  closing 
up  of  the  mine  before  all  possible  efforts  at  rescue  had 
been  exhausted.  Hardie,  ever  sensitive  where  the  lives 
of  miners  were  concerned,  gave  public  expression  to  his 
opinion  that  when  the  mine  was  bricked  up  the  men 
were  probably  still  alive;  an  opinion  which  Mr. 
Churchill,  the  Home  Secretary,  described  as  "cruel  and 
disgraceful."  Hardie,  of  course,  was  not  the  man  to  rest 
under  such  an  aspersion.  He  repeated  his  statement  in 
Parliament,  and  in  an  interview  replied  directly  to 
Churchill's  accusation,  and  raised  the  whole  question  of 
safety  in  mines.  "Mr.  Winston  Churchill's  comment," 
he  said,  "is  characterised  by  righteousness  which  could 
only  proceed  from  a  total  ignorance  of  what  I  said  and 
of  the  facts  of  the  case.  In  the  course  of  the  speech  to 
which  Mr.  Churchill  refers  I  gave  it  as  my  opinion, 
based  upon  my  practical  experience  as  a  miner,  that  at 

294 


WHITEHAVEN  DISASTER 

the  time  it  was  decided  to  wall  up  the  mine  the  miners 
were  in  all  probability  still  alive.  I  adhere  to  that 
opinion.  I  further  stated  that  had  the  spirit  of  the  Mines' 
Regulation  Act  been  carried  out  in  connection  with  the 
working  of  the  mine,  the  disaster  would  not  have 
occurred.  The  fire  which  imprisoned  the  miners  took 
place  in  what  was  known  as  the  bottle-neck,  and  appar- 
ently this  was  the  only  means  of  egress  from  the  work- 
ings beyond.  The  bottle-neck  working's  branch  oft  in 
five  main  levels,  and  it  would  have  been  an  easy  matter 
to  have  had  a  safety  road  laid  from  this  to  the  pit  shaft, 
so  that  in  the  event  of  the  main  haulage  road  between 
the  shaft  and  the  bottle-neck  getting  blocked  up,  the 
other  would  have  been  available  for  the  men  to  escape 
by.  I  suggested  that  these  were  matters  which  would 
require  to  be  investigated,  and  it  is  this  suggestion  which 
the  Home  Secretary  characterises  as  cruel  and  disgrace- 
ful. Working  miners  of  the  country  will  have  a  different 
opinion.  I  hope  Mr.  Churchill  is  not  more  concerned 
about  shielding^  the  mineowner  than  he  is  about  finding 
out  the  truth."  'Whether  Hardie  was  right  as  to  the  men 
being  alive  wKen  the  order  to  close  up  the  mines  was 
given,  cannot  now  be  proved,  but  his  opinion  had  the 
support  of  men  deeply  interested  in  the  matter,  the 
rescue  party  having  to  be  forcibly  restrained  from 
removing  the  brickwork  and  going  on  with  their  efforts 
to  save  life,  even  though  told  they  would  be  throwing 
their  own  lives  away. 

This  catastrophe  occurred  now  eleven  years  ago. 
The  mining  community  know  best  what  improvements, 
if  any,  have  taken  place  since  then,  and  they  also  are 
best  able  to  judge  whether  the  kind  of^protests  made  by 
Keir  Hardie  were  necessary  or  not.  QHe  never  forgot 
that  he  was  a  miner,  and  a  representative  of  minersj 

In  the  endeavour  to  preserve  some  continuity  in  this 

295 


J.    KEIR   HAHDIE 

story  of  Hardie's  life,  the  writer  has  up  to  the  present 

found  it  difficult  to  bring  into  view  one  aspect  of  his 

nature  which  is,  nevertheless,  essential  to  form  a  complete 

estimate  of  the  man.     His  love  for  and  understanding 

of  children  was  only  equalled  by  the  love  of  children 

for  him.     It  was  a  case  of  "like  draws  to  like."     Young 

folk  were  drawn  to  him  as  he  to  them,  instinctively.    He 

has  spoken  of  himself  as  the  man  who  never  was  a  child, 

and  that  was  true  so  far  as  his  own  literal  experience 

was  concerned.    Yet  it  might  be  even  truer  to  say  that 

he  was  all  his  life  a  child.     Perhaps,  even,  it  was  his 

childlike     directness     and     straightforwardness     that 

rendered  him  immune  from  all  kinds  of  sophistry  and 

double-dealing  and  made  him   a  perpetual  puzzle   to 

men  of  the  world  playing  the  game  of  politics.    Be  that 

as  it  may,  it  was  certainly  true  that  even  in  the  midst 

of  the  most  serious  work  he  could  lift  himself  out  of 

the  hurly-burly  and  become  as  a  little  child.     In  the 

many  households  which  he  entered  during  his  goings  to 

and  fro,  the  presence  of  children  always  put  him  at  his 

ease  and  made  him  feel  at  home.      There  are  many 

grown-up  men  and  women  in  the  Socialist  movement 

who  cherish  as  one  of  the  unforgettable  things  of  their 

bairntime  the  occasion  when  Keir  Hardie  took  them 

upon  his  knee,  or  hoisted  them  on  to  his  shoulders  and 

made   chums   of  them.      He  could   tell   them  stories, 

wonderful   stories — stories   sometimes   of   the  wise  pit 

ponies   that   were  his  own   chums  in   the   days  of  his 

boyhood,  or  of  the  ongoings  of  "Roy,"  the  wise  collie 

waiting  to  welcome  him  home  far  away  in  Cumnock,  or 

of  the  Red  Indians  he  had  met  in  America,  or,  as  often 

happened,  a  fairy  tale  made  up  "out  of  his  own  head"- 

that  very  head  amongst  whose  grizzled  locks  the  hands 

of  the  delighted  youngsters  were  at  that  moment  playing. 

This  love  and  understanding  of  children  did  not  in 

296 


CHILDREN 

any  way  interfere  with  or  hinder  his  work  for  Socialism. 
It  became  part  and  parcel  of  it.  In  the  1910  volume 
of  the  "Young  Socialist" — this  very  year  when  he 
and  his  colleagues  were  beset  by  so  much  political 
perplexity — there  is  a  short  story  entitled  "Jim"  written 
by  him.  A  story  of  a  forlorn  London  slum  laddie  and 
of  two  equally  forlorn  London  slum  dogs — the  only 
dogs  in  fiction  I  think  that  ever  entered  Heaven.  It  is 
a  simply  told  tale  blended  of  fantasy  and  realism,  of 
humour  and  pathos,  and  of  tender  deep  compassion. 
The  literary  world,  of  course,  never  heard  of  this  child 
story  by  Keir  Hardie,  nor  of  others  of  the  same  kind 
which  he  wrote  from  time  to  time.  They  were  not 
written  to  gain  money,  or  reputation.  They  were  written 
for  the  children  of  the  Socialist  movement.  In  the 
early  years  of  the  "Labour  Leader"  he,  under  the  nom 
de  -plume  of  "Daddy  Time,"  conducted  a  children's 
column  and  from  week  to  week  held  homely  converse 
with  the  bairns.  Around  this  weekly  talk  there  grew  a 
kind  of  young  folk's  fellowship,  which  called  ilself 
"The  Crusaders,"  and  out  of  this  again  there  came  the 
Socialist  Sunday  School  movement,  the  mere  sound 
and  rumour  of  which  has  made  the  hairs  of  so  many 
pious  but  ignorant  people  stand  on  end.  Good  men  and 
women  gave  their  time  and  love  to  the  building  of  it. 
Miss  Lizzie  Glasier,  the  sister  of  Bruce  Glasier, 
Archibald  McArthur  (known  as  "Uncle  Archie"),  Clarice 
McNab,  now  Mrs.  B.  H.  Shaw,  Alfred  Russell,  Robert 
Donaldson,  Fred  Coates,  Alex.  Gossip,  John  Burns  (of 
Glasgow),  and  a  host  of  others,  but  all  deriving  their 
inspiration  from  Hardie,  who,  to  them,  was  literally  the 
"Great  Exemplar."  Thousands  of  young  folks  have 
passed  through  the  schools  and  into  the  fighting  and 
teaching  ranks  of  the  general  Socialist  advance.  And 
so,  in  the  words  of  William  Morris,  "the  cause  goes 

297. 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

marching  on,"  and  with  it  the  name  and  the  memory  of 
Keir  Hardie. 

..September  brought  the  International  Socialist  Con- 
gress once  more,  this  time  at  Copenhagen.  This 
Congress  is  memorable  chiefly  for  the  proposal  by  the 
I.L.P.,  with  the  approval  of  the  British  section,  that 
the  General  Strike  should  be  considered  as  a  means 
of  preventing  war.,'  This  proposal  took  the  form  of  an 
amendment  to  the  resolution  brought  forward  by  the 
Commission  on  Anti-Militarism.  Hardie  had  endeav- 
oured to  get  his  proposal  incorporated  in  the  resolutions, 
and,  failing  in  that,  now  moved  it  as  an  amendment.  In 
view  of  all  that  has  happened  since,  and  of  what  is 
happening  still  in  the  efforts  to  reconstitute  a  satisfactory 
Socialist  International,  it  will  be  wise  to  reproduce  these 
resolutions  here,  with  the  "General  Strike"  amendment. 

"The  Congress,  reiterating  the  oft-repeated  duty  of 
Socialist  representatives  in  the  Parliaments  to  combat 
militarism  with  all  the  means  at  their  command  and  to 
refuse  the  means  of  armaments,  requires  from  its 
representatives  :— 

"(a)  The  constant  reiteration  of  the  demand  that 
international  arbitration  be  made  compulsory  in  all  inter- 
national disputes; 

"(b)  Persistent  and  repeated  proposals  in  the  direction 
of  ultimate  disarmament,  and,  above  all,  as  a  first  step, 
the  conclusion  of  a  general  treaty  limiting  naval  arma- 
ments and  abrogating  the  right  of  privateering; 

"(c)  The  demand  for  the  abolition  of  secret  diplomacy 
and  the  publication  of  all  existing  and  future  agreements 
between  the  Governments; 

"(d)  The  guarantee  of  the  independence  of  all  nations 
and  their  protection  from  military  attacks  and  violent 
suppression. 

"The  International  Socialist  Bureau  will  support  all 

298 


MILITARISM 

Socialist  organisations  in  this  fight  against  militarism  by 
furnishing  them  with  the  necessary  data  and  information, 
and  will,  when  the  occasion  arises,  endeavour  to  bring 
about  united  action.  In  case  of  warlike  complications 
this  Congress  re-affirms  the  resolution  of  the  Stuttgart 
Congress,  which  reads  : — 

'In  case  of  war  being  imminent,  the  working  classes 
and  their  Parliamentary  representatives  in  the  countries 
concerned  shall  be  bound,  with  the  assistance  of  the 
International  Socialist  Bureau,  to  do  all  they  can  to 
prevent  the  breaking  out  of  the  war,  using  for  this  pur- 
pose the  means  which  appear  to  them  to  be  most  effica- 
cious, and  which  must  naturally  vary  according  to  the 
acuteness  of  the  struggle  of  classes  and  to  the  general 
political  conditions. 

'In  case  war  should  break  out  notwithstanding,  they 
shall  be  bound  to  intervene,  that  it  may  be  brought  to 
a  speedy  end,  and  to  employ  all  their  forces  for  utilising 
the  economical  and  political  crisis  created  by  the  war, 
in  order  to  rouse  the  masses  of  the  people  and  to  hasten 
the  downfall  of  the  predominance  of  the  capitalist  class. 
'  'For  the  proper  execution  of  these  measures  the 
Congress  directs  the  Bureau,  in  the  event  of  a  war 
menace,  to  take  immediate  steps  to  bring  about  an  im- 
mediate agreement  among  the  Labour  parties  of  the 
countries  affected  for  united  action  to  prevent  the 
threatened  war.' 

Qt  is  easy  now  to  make  comment  upon  the  inherent      s 
ineffectiveness  of  these  proposals.    They  were,  however,  * 
the  outcome  of  years  of  deliberation  by  men  of  various 
nationalities  who  were  sincerely  desirous  of  two  things, 
the  abolition  of  war  and  the  establishment  of  Socialism, 
and  the  real  secret  of  their  inutility  may,  perhaps,    be 
found  in  the  fatalism  expressed  in  the  preamble,  which 
declared  that  "war  will  only  cease  with  the  disappear- 

299 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

ance  of  capitalist  production."  A  belief  in  the  inevit- 
ability of  war  is  not  a  good  foundation  upon  which  to 
build  measures  of  prevention.  These  proposals  relied 
upon  Parliamentary  action  to  prevent  war,  and  pre- 
supposed a  much  greater  possession  of  political  power 
on  the  part  of  Labour  than  has  ever  existed ;  and  they 
certainly  did  not  contemplate  a  world  conflagration 
involving  nations  that  had  no  parliamentary  institutions 
whatever!; 

The  I.C. P.  amendment  proposed  extra-parliamentary 
action;  direct  action  in  fact,  on  an  international  scale. 
It  was  as  follows  :  "This  Congress  recommends  the 
affiliated  Parties  and  Labour  organisations  to  consider 
the  advisability  and  feasability  of  the  general  strike, 
especially  in  industries  that  supply  war  material,  as  one 
of  the  methods  of  preventing  war,  and  that  action  be 
taken  on  the  subject  at  the  next  Congress." 

The  next  Congress  would  be  in  1913,  and  we  can 
now  see  that  if  in  the  intervening  years,  the  preparatory 
steps  for  enforcing  this  proposal  had  been  taken,  there 
would  yet  have  been  time  for  putting  its  efficacy  to  the 
test  in  August,  1914.  In  moving  this  amendment,  the 
British  section  believed  they  were  making  a  thoroughly 
practical  proposal  for  the  preservation  of  international 
peace.  Somewhere  there  may  be  in  existence  a  verbatim 
report  of  Hardie's  speech.  A  very  brief  summary, 
mainly  taken  from  the  descriptive  account  of  the  Con- 
gress by  Bru£e  Glasier  in  the  "Labour  Leader,"  will 
suffice  here.  {  Hardie  began  by  stating  that  he  desired 
that  the  position  of  the  Socialist  and  Labour  movement 
in  Britain  should  be  understood  by  their  foreign  com- 
rades. It  had  been  much  misrepresented.  The  British 
Labour  Party  took  a  very  definite  stand  against  war. 
They  were  not  only  anti-war  but  anti-military,  which  was 
not  quite  the  same  thing.  A  standing  army  was  an  indi- 

300 


MILITARISM 

cation  that  the  State  was  founded  on  force.  Militarism 
and  freedom  could  not  exist  side  by  side.  It  was  a 
source  of  great  pleasure  to  him  to  find  that  the  Socialists 
of  Denmark  and  Norway  were  not  only  against  large 
expenditure  in  armaments,  but  were  opposed  to  arma- 
ments altogether  and  had  moved  for  their  complete 
abolition.  There  was,  he  declared,  a  big  place  in  history 
for  the  nation  which  has  the  courage  and  faith  to  disarm 
itself.  No  country,  not  even  despotic  Russia,  would 
dare  to  attack  an  unarmed  nation.  Dealing  with  the 
argument  used  in  the  capitalist  press  for  a  large  navy, 
he  said  that  the  refusal  of  the  Hague  Conference,  in 
obedience  to  the  British  Government,  to  abolish  the 
capture  of  merchandise  at  sea,  did  much  to  excuse, 
though  it  might  not  justify,  that  argument.  He  dis- 
sociated the  British  movement  from  the  articles  by 
Blatchford  and  Hyndman  in  the  capitalist  press,  and  in 
"Justice"  and  the  "Clarion."  He  believed  that  the 
S.D.P.  delegates  would  endorse  his  statement  that  on 
this  question  these  men  spoke  only  for  themselves,  and 
that  every  section  of  the  Socialist  movement  in  Britain 
disapproved  of  their  utterances  and  their  conduct  in 
taking  sides  with  the  capitalist  press.  Ledebour,  without 
knowing  the  'difference  between  the  German  and  the 
British  Budget,  had  attacked  the  British  Labour  Party 
for  voting  for  taxation,  and  Hardie  replied.  To  vote 
for  the  rejection  of  the  entire  Budget,  would  be 
to  vote  against  the  provision  of  money  for  Old 
Age  Pensions,  against  the  payment  of  wages  for 
the  servants  of  the  State,  and  against  every  social 
undertaking  of  the  State.  The  I.L.P.  in  Britain 
were  arranging  for  a  great  campaign  against  war. 
Jaures  and  Vandervelde  were  coming  to  speak,  and  he 
hoped  that  Ledebour  himself  or  some  other  German 
comrade  would  come  also.  Turning  to  his  own  amend- 

301 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

ment,  he  offered  to  Ledebour  (the  mover  of  the 
official  resolution)  to  withdraw  the  addition,  provided 
he  would  agree  to  the  Bureau  circulating  a  paragraph 
embodying  the  amendment.  The  French,  American  and 
South  German  delegates  on  the  Commission  agreed  to 
support  that,  but  Ledebour,  on  behalf  of  the  Germans, 
declined.  It  was  true  that  a  general  strike  against  war 
could  only  come  by  the  international  agreement  of  the 
workers.  But  did  they  not  know  that  the  miners  at  their 
recent  International  Conference  had  actually  agreed 
that  this  very  question  should  be  referred  to  their 
Executive  in  order  that  it  might  be  considered  at  their 
next  Conference.  The  miners  alone  could  prevent  war 
by  withholding  supplies.  We  must  give  the  workers  a 
great  lead.  He  did  not  expect  that  the  workers  were  at 
present  ready  to  strike  against  war.  But  they  never 
would  be  ready  to  do  so  unless  we  helped  to  educate 
them  by  pointing  out  to  them  their  duty. 

The  value,  for  us,  of  this  utterance,  even  abbreviated, 
lies  in  the  fact  that  it  is  illuminative.  It  throws  light  on 
the  mental  attitudes  on  both  sides  in  the  discussion,  and 
we  are  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  all  these  men  were 
actuated  by  the  highest  motives  and  were  sincerely 
striving  to  find  a  solution  for  the  problems  confronting 
humanity.  The  Germans  would  not  mislead  the  Con- 
gress by  voting  for  a  resolution  which  they  thought 
impracticable.  Their  Marxian  theories  of  economic  deter- 
minism made  it  easy  for  the  Imperialist  and  Militarist 
forces  to  pursue  their  policy.  They  were  like  the  rabbit 
paralysed  by  the  serpent,  but  they  honourably  told  the 
Congress  that  if  a  war  came  they  did  not  believe  that 
a  general  strike  could  be  made  to  stop  it.  The  "Time 
Forces"  were  against  the  International  leaders. 
Capitalism  and  Imperialism  were  developing  faster 
than  International  Socialism  and  proletarian  power. 

302 


CHRISTIANITY 

On  this  question  it  was  not  found  necessary  to  divide 
the    Congress.      The    resolution   was    carried    on   the 
understanding  that  the  amendment  should  be  considered 
by   the    International    Socialist    Bureau,    the   German 
section  agreeing  to  this. 

|_This  was  not  Hardie's  only  visit  to  the  Continent 
during  this  year.  In  May,  he  had  been  to  Lille,  in  France, 
as  chief  speaker  in  a  propaganda  crusade  organised  by 
the  National  Council  of  the  Pleasant  Sunday  Afternoon 
and  the  Brotherhood  movements  of  Great  Britain.  To 
some  scoffers  the  idea  of  British  Nonconformists  teaching 
continental  workers  how  to  spend  pleasant  Sunday  after- 
noons was  not  without  its  humour;  but  that  aspect  did 
not  appeal  to  Hardie.  To  him  it  was  another  oppor- 
tunity for  preaching  Socialism  and  international 
goodwill,  and  he  made  full  use  of  it.  His  name  and 
fame  brought  together  a  great  assemblage  of  working 
folk,  and  besides  speaking  in  the  great  hall  of  L'Union 
de  Lille,  he  had  to  address  an  overflow  meeting  of  some 
six  thousand  in  the  Square,  delivering  an  oration  which, 
by  its  religious  fervour  and  idealism,  made  him  more 
than  ever  a  man  of  mystery  to  the  scientific  Socialists 
who  found  in  the  materialist  conception  of  history  the 
only  key  to  the  explanation  of  every  problem.  What 
kind  of  a  Socialist  could  he  be  who  said,  "Behind  nature 
there  is  a  Power,  unseen  but  felt.  Beyond  death  there 
is  a  Something,  else  were  life  on  earth  a  mere  wast  age,  " 
and  who  declared,  "I  myself  have  found  in  the  Christian- 
ity of  Christ  the  inspiration  which  first  of  all  drove  me 
into  the  movement  and  has  carried  me  on  in  it. ' '  Yet  this 
man  was  an  advocate  of  the  general  strike.  They  could 
not  understand  him.  Nor  could  the  commercialised  pro- 
fessors of  Christianity.  To  both  he  was  an  enigma  ~  j 

There  was  nothing  enigmatical,  however,  about  his 
action  a  few  weeks  later,  when,  in  the  House  of  Com- 

303 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

mons,  he  was  attacking  the  Home  Secretary  and  the  War 
Minister  for  having  sent  police  and  military  into  Wales 
during  a  miners'  strike.  This  dispute  had  originated  in 
the  Rhondda  Valley,  where  11,000  miners  had  come 
out  on  strike,  demanding  an  equalisation  of  wages  with 
other  collieries — demanding,  in  fact,  a  minimum  wage. 
There  had  been  some  disturbance  at  Tonypandy,  due, 
as  Hardie  alleged,  to  the  importation  of  police  from  out- 
side the  district.  In  addition  to  the  imported  police, 
military  had  been  sent  into  the  district,  and  also 
to  Aberaman,  which  was  in  Hardie's  constituency, 
where  he  maintained  there  had  not  been  even  a 
semblance  of  riot  or  disturbance.  In  the  strike 
district  the  police  had  interfered  to  prevent  picketing, 
which  he  contended  was  still  lawful,  and,  in  fact, 
he  charged  Mr.  Haldane  and  Mr.  Churchill  with 
using  the  forces  at  their  disposal  to  protect  blacklegs 
and  help  the  masters  against  the  men.  In  proof  of  his 
assertion  that  the  rioting  was  due  to  outside  influence, 
he  pointed  out  that  at  Pen-y-craig,  where  there  were  no 
imported  police,  there  had  been  no  rioting,  though  there 
had  been  picketing  and  demonstrations  of  the  kind  com- 
mon to  a  labour  dispute.  There  was  not  even  a  window 
broken  in  this  district.  In  raising  this  matter  in  the 
House,  Hardie  was,  of  course,  supported  by  the  Parlia- 
mentary Labour  Party,  and  also  by  his  Liberal  colleague 
in  the  representation  of  Merthyr,  Mr.  Edgar  Jones.  A 
debate  ensued,  followed  by  a  division,  the  only  effect 
of  which  was  to  emphasise  the  fact  that,  in  a  quarrel 
.  between  labour  and  capital,  Liberals  and  Tories  were 
''*  united  on  the  side  of  capital.  From  Hardie's  point  of 
view  this  was  worth  while.  Every  time  this  was  demon- 
strated, the  need  for  Labour  representation  was  also 
demonstrated.  This  might  not  be  the  class  war  according 
to  the  Marxists,  nor  brotherly  love  according  to 

304 


GENERAL   ELECTION 

the  churches;  but  it  was  one  of  the  roads  to  Socialism 
according  to  Hardie.  He  might,  with  some  truth,  have 
claimed  that  he  was  a  better  Marxist  and  a  better 
Christian  than  either  of  therrLj 

About  this  time  he  produced  a  scheme  for  the  starting 
of  a  Socialist  daily  newspaper,  the  need  for  which  had 
long  been  recognised,  and  had  so  far  proceeded  with  his 
plans  as  to  justify  him  in  the  hope  that  the  first  number 
would  appear  on  May  ist  of  the  following  year.  Another 
General  Election,  however,  intervened,  absorbing  all 
the  energy  and  spare  cash  of  the  Party,  and  later  there 
emerged  from  the  Labour  Party  a  more  ambitious,  though 
not,  in  the  opinion  of  the  present  writer,  a  more  useful, 
scheme.  The  ''Daily  Citizen"  was  the  outcome. 

Night  after  night  in  Parliament  he  continued  question- 
ing and  compelling  discussion  on  the  state  of  matters  in 
South  Wales,  always  producing  fresh  evidence  in  proof 
of  the  barbarous  methods  of  the  police  authorities,  and 
demanding  an  impartial  inquiry  into  the  whole  circum- 
stances of  the  dispute,  until  in  the  first  week  in  December 
there  came  the  General  Election,  and  the  transference 
of  his  activities  to  the  actual  scene  of  industrial  strife. 
The  strike  was  still  proceeding.  There  was  much  dis- 
tress in  the  Rhondda  and  in  parts  of  the  Merthyr  con- 
stituency, and,  in  view  of  the  action  of  the  Government 
in  the  dispute,  the  Liberals  did  not  dare  to  put  up  a 
candidate  against  him.  There  was  a  Unionist  candidate, 
but  without  even  a  hope  of  success,  and  for  Hardie  the 
result  was  never  in  doubt.  He  polled  11,507  votes,  and 
his  majority  was  6,230.  It  was  the  end.  He  did  not 
know,  nor  could  he  nor  anyone  know,  that  he  had  fought 
his  last  election  contest,  and  that  that  night  he  had  heard 
for  the  last  time  the  crowds  hail  him  victor.  His  death 
was  to  cause  the  next  Merthyr  fight.  And  by  that  time 
Merthyr  had  changed;  the  whole  world  had  changed. 

305 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

The  calamity  which  he  dreaded,  and  which  he  fought  so 
hard  to  avert,  had  come  to  pass.  It  was  at  least  in 
keeping  with  his  life  that  his  last  political  campaign 
amongst  the  Merthyr  miners  should  have  had  for  its 
first  and  immediate  issue  the  well-being  of  his  class 
and  craft. 

In  the  outcome  of  this  election  the  Labour  Party  more 
than  regained  its  position.  It  went  back  to  Parliament 
forty-two  in  number.  Of  these,  eight  were  I.L.P. 
nominees,  the  most  outstanding  amongst  the  newcomers 
being  George  Lansbury  and  Tom  Richardson;  the 
latter's  return  as  an  I.L.P.  nominee  being  a  significant 
sign  of  the  advance  towards  Socialism  on  the  part  of  the 
North  of  England  miners. 

The  Liberal  and  Tory  Parties  had  exactly  two  hundred 
and  seventy-two  members  each.  The  Liberal  Govern- 
ment was  therefore  dependent  for  its  continuance  in 
office  upon  the  Irish  Party  and  the  Labour  Party.  In 
these  circumstances,  had  it  not  been  that  Liberal  and 
Tory  were  alike  Imperialist,  there  might  have  been  no 
war  in  1914. 

It  is  strange  to  reflect  that  during  the  whole  of  this 
General  Election  the  subject  of  war  was  never  men- 
tioned. Foreign  policy  was  never  mentioned.  Arma- 
ments were  never  mentioned.  Yet  a  Government  was 
elected  that  took  this  country  into  the  most  terrible  war 
the  world  has  ever  seen.  As  a  decoy-duck  Lloyd  George 
was  a  success.  He  attracted  the  fire  that  should  have 
been  directed  against  Grey  and  Haldane  and  the  British 
war-lords.  Only  the  Socialists  were  alive  to  the  impend- 
ing danger.  During  November,  the  I.L.P.  had  carried 
through  a  strenuous  anti-militarist  campaign,  holding 
big  meetings  in  all  the  large  centres  of  population,  and 
in  December,  right  in  the  middle  of  the  election,  and 
without  any  pre-arranged  connection  therewith,  there 

306 


Citvright 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE,   1910 


INTERNATIONALISM 

took  place  in  the  Albert  Hall,  London,  the  great  Inter- 
national Socialist  Demonstration  organised  by  the 
I.L.P.  with  the  view  of  strengthening  the  solidarity  of 
Labour  in  all  countries  against  war.  At  this  meeting 
Hardie  was  in  the  chair.  France  was  represented  by 
Jaures;  Germany  by  Molkenbuhr;  Belgium  by  Vander- 
velde;  Great  Britain  by  MacDonald  and  Anderson; 
America  by  Walter  T.  Mills.  The  talk  was  all  of  peace 
and  goodwill,  and  of  the  power  of  organised  labour  to 
preserve  Europe  from  the  scourge  of  war.  Jaures,  the 
greatest  of  Socialist  orators,  spoke  like  one  inspired — 
Jaures,  marked  out  as  one  of  the  war's  earliest  victims; 
yet  happier  was  he  than  Hardie,  for  he  was  to 
fall  quickly  and  suddenly  and  to  be  spared  from  behold- 
ing the  full  international  collapse  and  the  betrayals 
that  followed  it. 

At  least,  they  were  there,  the  Socialists  of  France, 
Germany,  Belgium,  Britain,  the  nations  that  were,  even 
then,  being  drawn  into  the  whirlpool  of  blood ;  they  were 
there,  these  Socialists,  doing  what  could  be  done  to 
prevent  the  catastrophe.  But  the  people  never  heard 
them.  The  people  were  singing  the  "Land  Song." 
They  were  listening  to  Lloyd  George  and  "waiting  and 
seeing,"  or  rather,  waiting  and  not  seeing,  what  Mr. 
Asquith  was  going  to  give  them ;  and  the  second  General 
Election  of  1910  ended  like  the  first,  in  the  achievement 
of  nothing,  except  the  blindfolding  of  the  British 
people  and  the  election  of  a  House  of  Commons  with 
neither  political  principle  nor  foresight. 

Hardly  had  the  election  cries  subsided,  when  there 
came  the  news  in  the  last  week  of  the  year  of 
another  great  mining  disaster,  this  time  in  Lancashire 
at  the  Hulton  collieries,  known  as  the  Pretoria  Pit 
disaster.  Hardie's  last  task  for  the  year  was  to 
write  an  article  for  the  "Labour  Leader,"  similar  to  so 

307 


J.    KEIR  HARDIE 

many  he  had  written  in  the  course  of  his  life,  protesting 
against  the  callous  indifference  of  the  Government  and 
all  in  authority  to  the  continued  needless  sacrifice 
of  the  lives  of  the  miners.  Only  those  in  close 
daily  intercourse  with  him  knew  how  these  recurring 
calamities  filled  him  with  wrath  almost  to  blasphemy. 
There  was  the  usual  coroner's  inquest,  inculpating 
nobody.  There  was  the  usual  inquiry,  followed  by  recom- 
mendations six  months  later,  but  valueless  without  Home 
Office  compulsory  powers.  We  do  not  require  to  remind 
ourselves  that  Parliament  was  dominated  by  the  vested 
interests. 

During  all  this  time  the  Rhondda  strike  continued 
and  the  distjess  amongst  the  miners  and  their  dependents 
increased.-  1911,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  a  year  of 
industrial  flpheaval  almost  unprecedented  in  its  univer- 
sality. In  nearly  every  industry  the  workers  were  at 
one  time  or  other  in  revolt,  but  the  outstanding  disputes 
were  those  which  produced  the  great  railway  strike,  and 
prolonged  this  heartbreaking  struggle  in  the  Rhondda. 
In  both  of  these,  Hardie,  by  sheer  force  of  circumstances, 
could  not  help  becoming  a  prominent  figure.  His  pro- 
test against  the  intervention  of  the  police  and  the  military 
in  the  Welsh  dispute  has  already  been  recorded.  It  was 
the  same  cause,  more  tragically  emphasised,  which 
compelled  the  Labour  Party  to  raise  the  matter  of  the 
railway  strike  in  Parliament.  The  full  story  of  the  dis- 
pute need  not  be  retold.  The  fundamental  cause  of  the 
quarrel  was  the  refusal  of  the  railway  companies  to 
recognise  the  Railwaymen's  Union,  a  refusal  in  which 
the  companies  had  the  encouragemnt  of  the  Govern- 
ment. Even  before  the  outbreak  of  hostilities,  and 
while  negotiations  were  proceeding  out  of  which  a 
peaceful  settlement  was  possible,  the  Home  Office,  with 
the  concurrence  of  the  War  Office,  two  departments  of 

308 


INDUSTRIAL   STRIFE 

which  Mr.  Churchill  and  Mr.  Haldane  were  the  chiefs, 
had  guaranteed  to  the  companies  the  use  of  the  forces 
of  the  Crown,  and  did  actually  implement  their  promise 
to  such  an  extent  that  at  one  time  it  was  estimated  that 
every  available  soldier  on  home  service  was  held  ready 
for  action.  The  result  was  what  might  have  been 
expected.  The  railway  directors  stiffened  their  backs. 
The  strike  took  place.  Non-union  blacklegs  were  given 
military  protection.  Men  were  shot  down,  one  fatally 
at  Liverpool,  two  fatally  at  Llanelly  in  Wales.  In  both 
cases  the  victims  were  wholly  unconnected  with  the 
dispute. 

'^The  fact  of  the  Government's  preliminary  guarantee 
to  the  companies  was  well  established  in  the  course  of 
the  parliamentary  discussions,  and  the  manner  of  their 
interpretation  of  their  powers  by  the  military  was  clearly 
illustrated  by  the  evidence  at  the  Llanelly  inquest  given 
by  Major  Stewart,  who  repudiated  the  suggestion  that 
blank  cartridges  were  fired,  and  declared  that  he  had 
instructions  from  the  War  Office,  empowering  him  to 
fire  without  orders  from  the  magistrates :  a  state  of 
matters  which  meant  in  effect,  that  a  condition  of  martial 
law  had  been  established  without  the  sanction  of 
Parliament,  but  with  the  sanction  of  a  Liberal  Govern- 
ment, or,  in  any  event,  of  a  Liberal  War  Minister. 

\The  strike  was  settled  ultimately  by  the  full  recog- 
nition of  the  Union  and  the  appointment  of  a  Royal 
Commission  to  inquire  into  the  railwaymen's  grievances. 
In  the  course  of  the  discussion  on  the  settlement,  Mr. 
Lloyd  George  made  a  violent  attack  on  Hardi-e  for 
having  stated  that  the  Government  had,  while  granting 
the  aid  of  the  military,  made  no  attempt  to  bring  pressure 
upon  the  directors  to  meet  the  men.  Hardie  had  made 
this  statement,  referring  to  a  declaration  of  the  Prime 
Minister  previous  to  the  strike,  but  Mr.  George,  with 

v  309 


J.    KEIR   BARDIE 

his  customary  slim  dishonesty,  sought  to  make  it  appear 
as  if  Hardie's  remark  applied  to  a  subsequent  stage, 
when  the  Government  had  belatedly  endeavoured  to 
bring  the  parties  together.  Hardie,  of  course,  held  to 
his  original  statement,  the  truthfulness  of  which  was 
testified  to  by  the  following  resolution  passed  by  the 
Railwaymen's  Joint  Executive  :  "This  Joint  Executive 
body  repudiates  the  unwarrantable  attack  by  the  Chan- 
cellor of  the  Exchequer  upon  Mr.  Keir  Hardie  for  using 
arguments  which  each  of  the  forty  representatives 
present  at  the  Board  of  Trade  feels  were  quite  justi- 
fiable after  the  language  and  attitude  of  the  Prime 
Minister.  We  further  extend  the  best  thanks  of  the  Joint 
Executive,  representing  all  railway  workers,  to  Mr.  Keir 
Hardie  and  the  Labour  Party  for  their  splendid  service 
in  helping,  both  to  bring  the  men  out,  and  get  them  back 
again  when  the  truce  was  called." 

i  Another  Labour  dispute  in  which  Hardie  was  very 
cfirectly  interested,  and  in  which  he  rendered  invaluable 
service  to  the  workers  concerned,  was  that  which  occurred 
at  the  Dowlais  Ironworks  in  his  own  constituency.  This 
dispute  had  features  in  common  both  with  that  of  the 
Rhondda  miners  and  the  railwaymen.  It  was  a  demand 
to  have  the  rates  of  pay  equalised  with  those  paid  by 
other  firms  in  the  same  industry,  and  it  was  also  a  demand 
for  recognition  of  Trade  Unionism.  On  both  points  the 
men  won  after  a  protracted  struggle,  but  not  before 
Hardie  in  Parliament  had  brought  such  pressure  to  bear 
upon  the  Government  for  the  enforcement  of  the  Fair 
Wages'  Clause  in  Government  contracts  that  the  firm, 
Guest.  Keen  and  Nettlefold,  Ltd.,  were  compelled  to 
concede  the  demands  rather  than  lose  their  contracts 
with  the  Government  of  India  and  with  other  Depart- 
ments. This  was  the  kind  of  object  lesson  in  the  value 
of  Labour  representation  which  even  the  most  non- 

310 


THE   BRINK   OF   WAR 

political  worker  could  appreciate,  and  the  part  played 
by  Hardie  enhanced  his  already  very  great  popularity 
with  his  working-class  constituents.  Incidentally  also 
it  illustrated  Hardie's  remarkable  capacity  for  assimil- 
ating knowledge  in  connection  with  other  forms  of 
industry  than  that  in  which  he  was  himself  expert.  He 
showed  himself  able  to  discuss  details  and  technicalities 
in  connection  with  the  steel  and  iron  trade  as  familiarly 
as  if  he  had  been  bred  to  the1  forge  instead  of  the  coal- 
face. This  adaptability  applies  to  every  other  branch 
of  industry  in  connection  with  which  he  had  a  case  to 
uphold  or  defend.  He  was  very  thorough,  and  always 
made  sure  of  his  facts. 

It  will  be  perceived  that  during  the  whole  of  this 
session  his  time  was  spent  alternating  between  the 
House  of  Commons  and  South  Wales,  and,  as  we  shall 
see,  in  the  former  place  there  were  other  things  than 
industrial  strikes  demanding  attention.  Meantime  it 
should  be  noted  that  he  was  writing  assiduously,  and,  in 
addition  to  occasional  articles  in  the  "Labour  Leader" 
and  other  papers,  was  supplying  two  or  three  columns 
weekly  to  the  "Merthyr  Pioneer,"  a  weekly  paper  which 
the  local  I.L.P.  brought  into  existence  in  March  of  this 
year.  In  this  journal  he  found  once  again  the  medium 
for  the  expression  not  merely  of  his  opinions,  but  of 
his  personality  which  had  been  the  chief  characteristic 
of  the  "Labour  Leader"  in  its  early  days.  Almost 
till  the  day  of  his  death  he  made  use  of  the  "Pioneer" 
in  this  way. 

With  all  this  industrial  strife  and  turmoil,  and  with 
an  Insurance  Bill  and  a  House  of  Lords'  Veto  Bill  to 
talk  about,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  general  body  of 
the  people  had  neither  eyes  nor  ears  for  foreign  affairs, 
and  were  not  aware  that  the  nation  had  been  brought 
almost  to  the  brink  of  war,  though  there  were  whispers 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

that  the  possibility  of  the  troops  being  required 
for  service  abroad  had  hastened  the  railway  strike 
settlement. 

The  crisis  over  Morocco  arising  out  of  the  rival  inter- 
ests of  French  and  German  financiers  in  that  country, 
in  which  the  influence  of  the  British  Government 
was  manifested  on  the  side  of  France,  took  place  in 
June,  but  it  was  the  end  of  November  before,  on  the 
Foreign  Office  vote,  a  parliamentary  statement  could 
be  extracted  from  Sir  Edward  Grey  on  a  question  which 
had  so  nearly  involved  the  country  in  war.  In  the  debate 
which  followed,  Ramsay  MacDonald  pointed  out  that  it 
was  the  Socialist  Party  in  the  German  Reichstag  whose 
influence  had  prevailed  upon  the  German  Government 
to  refrain  from  an  immediate  retort  to  Lloyd  George's 
provocative  Mansion  House  speech,  and  had  thereby  in 
all  probability  preserved  the  peace  of  Europe.  Mac- 
Donald  rejoiced  that  he  belonged  to  a  Party  which  was 
in  this  country  the  equivalent  of  the  German  Social 
Democratic  Party  in  its  efforts  to  avert  international  war. 

Hardie,  in  the  same  debate,  spoke  with  grave  sarcasm 
of  the  self-confessed  puerility  of  high  State  officials. 
"He  did  not  know  how  the  rest  of  the  House  felt,  but 
when  the  Foreign  Secretary  was  telling  them  how  on 
one  occasion  the  German  Ambassador  called  upon  him, 
and  Sir  Edward  Grey  asked  for  some  explanation  about 
the  presence  of  the  German  warships  at  Agadir,  the  Ger- 
man Ambassador  replied,  'I  shall  not  tell  anything 
about  Agadir  until  you  have  explained  Lloyd  George's 
speech/  and  the  Foreign  Secretary  replied,  'I  shall 
not  explain  Lloyd  George's  speech  until  you  have  told 
us  about  the  presence  of  the  warship  at  Agadir' — he 
could  not  help  feeling  that  two  statesmen  of  international 
repute  were  behaving  like  school  children.  Yet  those 
were  the  men  whom  the  two  countries  concerned  were 

312 


THE   BRINK   OF   WAR 

asked  to  trust  implicitly  with  the  control  of  foreign 
affairs." 

In  this  same  speech  he  went  to  the  root  of  the  matter. 
"Let  them  take  the  whole  of  the  agreements  concluded 
during  the  last  five  or  six  years  between  this  country  and 
other  countries,  about  Egypt,  about  Morocco,  and  about 
Persia,  and  they  would  see  what  we  were  concerned  with 
was  not  the  promotion  of  the  liberties  of  the  peoples  of 
those  countries,  was  not  the  protection  of  the  honour  of 
the  people  of  this  country,  but  the  protection  of  profits 
and  dividends." 

The  situation,  both  in  Morocco  and  Egypt,  as  it 
appeared  to  the  I.L.P.  leaders,  and  to  other  thoughtful, 
peace-loving  people  was  fraught  with  peril,  not  only  to 
this  country,  but  to  the  whole  of  Europe. 

We  may  well  regret  that  this  debate  was  not  allowed 
in  June  instead  of  in  November.  That  it  was  not,  shows 
that  the  Foreign  Office  had  definitely  made  up  its  mind 
to  conceal  events  from  Parliament  and  hoodwink  it 
should  a  crisis  arise. 

These  casual  extracts  from  the  many  utterances  of 
MacDonald  and  Hardie,  however,  are  placed  here  to 
show  that  for  the  ultimate  catastrophe,  they,  and  those 
for  whom  they  spoke,  were  free  from  responsibility. 
That  in  the  midst  of  all  their  other  work,  in  Parliament 
and  in  the  country,  they  should  have  been  so  vigilantly 
watchful  in  a  sphere  of  politics  to  which  the  people  in 
general  were  indifferent,  was  due,  of  course,  to  that  belief 
in  the  international  unity  of  interests  which  is  inherent  in 
the  very  spirit  of  the  Socialist  movement.  They  also 
knew  far  more  than  most  Members  of  Parliament,  and 
were  better  able  to  see  what  was  coming  and  how  to 
avert  it. 

MacDonald,  at  this  very  time,  was  himself  passing 
through  the  Vale  of  Sorrow,  the  death  of  Mrs.  Mac- 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

Donald  in  the  previous  September  having  bereft  him  of 
a  companionship  which  could  never  be  replaced,  and 
which  had  been  invaluable  to  the  Socialist  movement. 
These  last  years  of  Keir  Hardie's  life — for  we  are 
now  nearing  the  end — are  very  difficult  to  describe  in 
such  a  way  as  to  make  vivid  the  environment,  political, 
social  and  intellectual,  which  encompassed  him.  These 
years  are  so  near  to  us  in  time  and  so  unripened  as  to 
their  harvest,  that  it  seems  like  writing  about  current 
events,  and  yet  they  are  separated  from  us  by  an  inter- 
vening history  so  immeasurable  in  its  effects,  that  they 
appear  to  belong  to  almost  another  epoch  than  ours.  To 
recover  the  social  and  political  atmosphere,  to  recon- 
struct the  conditions,  to  appreciate  the  motives  by  which 
people  were  actuated  in  those  days  seem  well  nigh 
impossible.  Yet  that  is  what  we  must  do  if  we  are  to 
have  any  conception  of  what  those  closing  years  were 
to  Keir  Hardie.  We  must  see  the  world  as  it  appeared 
to  him  in  those  days.  How  many  of  us,  for  example, 
can  recollect  or  revisualise  what  was  happening  in  1912, 
much  less  recall  what  we  were  thinking  about  at  that 
time. 

In  1912,  it  will  be  remembered,  occurred  the  great 
tTonal  miners'  strike,  which  resulted  in  legalising,  for 
the  first  time,  the  principle  of  a  minimum  wage  for 
miners.  1912  was  the  year  of  the  bitterly  fought  London 
dock  strike,  in  which  the  workers  were  defeated, 
humiliated  and  actually  starved  into  submission,  with 
Mr.  Tillett,  the  dockers'  leader,  praying  theatrically  on 
Tower  Hill  that  God  might  strike  Lord  Devonport 
dead;  the  same  Lord  Devonport  with  whom,  and  with 
whose  class,  Mr.  Tillett  was  in  enthusiastic  accord  only 
two  years  later.  1912  was  the  year  in  which  Tom  Mann, 
Fred  Crowley  and  Guy  Bowman  were  imprisoned  for 
advising  soldiers  not  to  shoot  their  fellow-workers  on 

3H 


THE   BRINK   OF   WAR 

strike,  little  thinking  how  near  was  the  time  when 
workers  would  be  shooting  workers  on  a  scale  unimagin- 
able to  those  courageous  protesters  against  working- 
class  fratricide.  1912  was  the  year  when  there  were 
hundreds  of  women  in  prison,  hunger-striking  and 
enduring  the  tortures  of  forcible  feeding  and  unable,  of 
course,  to  foresee  how  soon  political  right,  withheld  from 
them  when  claimed  on  grounds  of  justice,  would  be 
thrown  to  them  as  a  bribe,  or  as  a  reward  for  war  ser- 
vice— the  very  kind  of  service  for  which  they  were  said 
to  be  unfit.  1912  was  the  year  of  the  Irish  Home  Rule 
Act  which  never  became  operative.  It  was  also  the  year 
in  which  Cabinet  Ministers  encouraged,  and  to  some 
extent  organised,  rebellion  in  the  North  of  Ireland,  and 
when  Mr.  Bonar  Law  declared,  blind  to  the  possibility 
that  South  of  Ireland  rebels^  would  hearken  to  those 
brave  words  and  act  upon  them,  "I  can  imagine -no 
length  of  resistance  to  which  Ulster  will  go  which  I 
shall  not  be  ready  to  support."  It  was  thus  the  memor- 
able year  when  the  leaders  of  the  Unionist  Party 
declared,  and  carried  their  Party  with  them  in  making 
their  declaration,  that  a  class  which  finds  itself  outvoted 
in  Parliament  may  resort  to  arms  and  revolution  to  undo 
what  was  done  through  the  ballot  box.  This  was  the 
year  of  the  Unemployment  Insurance  Bill  giving  legis- 
lative recognition  to  the  State's  liability  for  the  condi- 
tion of  the  people.  1912  was  the  year  in  which  the  I.L.P. 
and  the  Fabians  joined  forces  in  a  great  "War  against 
Poverty"  campaign  demanding  the  establishment  of  a 
minimum  standard  of  life,  and  submitting  proposals  for 
the  achievement  of  that  purpose. 

f  We  have  only  to  mention  these  movements  and  events 
ta  understand  what  would  be  the  attitude  of  Keir  Hardie 
towards  each  and  all  of  them.  His  principles  were 
fixed,  his  record  was  open.  By  his  past  conduct  you 

315 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

could  always  tell  what  his  present  or  future  conduct 
would  be  in  any  given  set  of  circumstances.  In  much 

ythat  was  happening  in  the  industrial  world  he  could  see 
the  outcome  of  his  own  past  labours.  The  national 
strike  of  miners :  what  was  it  but  the  outward  and 
visible  sign  of  that  unity  in  the  coal  industry  which  he 
had  advocated  as  far  back  as  1886  when  he  became  the 
first  Secretary  of  the  Scottish  Miners5  Federation?  The 
Insurance  Bill  :  what  was  it  but  one  of  the  fruits  of  his 
long  years  of  agitation  in  and  out  of  Parliament  on 
behalf  of  the  unemployed  ?  It  was  not  what  he  wanted. 
It  was  not  the  "right  to  work."  He  described  it  as  a 
slipshod  measure  and  sarcastically  commented  that  its 
beneficiaries  would  still  have  plenty  of  opportunity  for 
the  cultivation  of  habits  of  thrift;  but  makeshift  though 
it  was,  it  was  better  than  nothing.  In  essence,  its  second 
part  was  an  admission  of  the  workless  man's  right  to 
live,  and  it  would  not  have  been  there  but  for  Keir 
Hardie. 

For  British  Socialists  the  time  was  one  of  high  hopes, 
alternating  with  almost  paralysing  fears.  The  hopes  lay 
in  the  evidences  of  the  growing  solidarity  of  organised 
labour;  the  fears  had  their  source  in  the  ever-present 
danger  of  an  outbreak  of  war  in  Europe  which  would 
overwhelm  all  plans  for  human  betterment.  In  Hardie's 
mind,  on  the  whole,  the  hopes  overbalanced  the  fears. 
In  the  case  of  the  Morocco  crisis,  war  had  been  arrested. 
It  might  be  so  again  and  again  until  the  sheer  stupidity 
of  having  recourse  to  such  a  method  of  settling  disputes 
would  become  universally  recognised  and  the  means 
of  preventing  it  by  international  action  would  be 
strengthened.  He  was  naturally  an  optimist  and  fain 
to  persuade  himself  that  the  power  of  international 
Socialism  and  the  common  sense  of  humanity  would  be 
stronger  than  the  Imperialist  and  capitalist  forces 

3*6 


THE    BRINK   OF   WAR 

making  for  war,  It  was  well  for  him  at  this  time  to  be 
able  to  cherish,  even  doubtfully,  such  a  faith.  Other- 
wise he  would  haye  had  little  zest  in  life  during  these 
remaining  years^Unlike  some  other  Socialists,  he  could 
find  no  compensating  comfort  in  the  theory  that  a 
European  war,  with  all  its  evils,  would  at  least  precipi- 
tate revolution.  For  him,  the  possible  fruits  of  a  revo- 
lution were  not  worth  the  terrible  price  that  would  have 
to  be  paid  for  them.  He  had  always  believed,  and  still 
believed,  that  Socialism  could  be  ushered  in  without 
violent  and  bloody  revolution.  That  was  why  he  was  in 
Parliament.  That  was  why  he  favoured  the  general 
strike.  That  was  why  he  strove  to  destroy  the  militarist 
idea  in  association  with  the  Socialist  movement  and 
opposed  resolutely  all  "citizen  army"  proposals.  For 
him,  a  war-engendered  revolution  was  no  gateway  to  any 
promised  land.  Though  he  knew  well  what  kind  of  war 
the  Great  War  would  be,  if  it  came,  he  refused  to  admit 
that  it  was  inevitable,  and  in  this  frame  of  mind  he  went 
on  with  his  work.  ""7 

This  year,  much  to  the  satisfaction  of  Hardie  and  his 
South  Wales  supporters,  the  I.L.P.  Annual  Conference 
was  held  at  Merthyr,  the  object  being  to  mark  the 
general  movement's  appreciation  of  the  stalwarts  who, 
in  the  darkest  hour  of  the  Independent  Labour  Party  had 
sent  its  leader  to  Parliament  and  had  steadfastly  stood 
by  him  ever  since.  The  chief  subject  of  debate  at  the 
Conference  was  Parliamentary  policy,  involving  the 
vexed  question  which  had  troubled  the  movement  ever 
since  the  formation  of  the  Parliamentary  Labour  Party, 
as  to  whether  that  Party,  and  especially  the  I.L.P.  mem- 
bers of  it,  should  vote  on  every  question  on  its  merits, 
or  should  be  guided  by  the  general  political  exigencies 
which  the  Party  had  to  face  from  time  to  time.  The 
Latter  policy  was  endorsed  by  the  Conference,  Hardie 

3 '7 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

speaking  in  support  of  it;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact,  on 
this  occasion  the  Conference  itself  was  a  secondary 
function,  compared  with  the  public  manifestations  of 
Socialist  feeling  in  the  constituency  and  personal 
attachment  to  Hardie.  The  local  comrades  were  proud 
of  their  Member,  and  he  was  proud  of  them.  Francis, 
Davies,  Morris,  Barr,  Stonelake,  and  all  the  others  who 
had  done  the  spade-work  and  the  fighting,  took  pride- 
as  they  were  well  entitled  to  do — in  their  past  achieve- 
ments, and  were  full  of  confidence  for  the  future.  He 
would  have  taken  great  risks  who  would  have  suggested 
that  anything  could  ever  happen  to  dim  the  popularity 
of  their  hero  in  Merthyr  Tydvil.  To  their  credit  and 
honour  these  men  all  stood  firm  when  the  hour  of  trial 
came.  They  came  through  the  fire  like  fine  gold.  At 
that  moment  such  a  trial  seemed  so  far  off  as  to  be 
impossible.  Yet  it  was  near  at  hand. 

During  the  parliamentary  session  he  took  his  full 
share  of  the  work,  and  with  George  Lansbury  was 
specially  active  in  protesting  against  the  vindictive 
treatment  of  the  suffragist  women  in  prison,  whilst  as 
usual  he  was  also  very  much  in  evidence  on  the  propa- 
ganda platform,  and  in  various  ways  showed  himself  to 
be  full  of  life  and  vigour,  i^ln  the  early  autumn, 
preparatory  to  going  to  America  for  an  eight  weeks' 
tour  in  support  of  Eugene  Debs's  candidature  for  the 
Presidency Jhe  spent  a  short  holiday  in  Arran  with  his 
wife  and  daughter. 

A  rhyming  note  which  he  sent  from  there  in  reply  to 
some  birthday  congratulation  in  verse  reveals  him  as 
being  in  good  health  and  spirits. 

"Dear  Comrade,  if  you  flatter  so, 
You'll  make  an  old  man  vaunty  : 
I'm  six  and  fifty  years,  'tis  true, 
And  much  have  had  to  daunt  me. 


AMERICA 

"But  what  of  that?     My  life's  been  blest, 
With  health  and  faith  abiding; 
I've  never  sought  the  rich  man's  smile, 
I've  never  shirked  a  hiding. 

"I've  tried  to  do  my  duty  to 
My  conscience  and  my  neighbour, 
Regardless  of  the  gain  or  loss 
Involved  in  the  endeavour. 

"A  happy  home,  a  loving  wife, 
An  I.L.P.  fu'  healthy; 
I  wadna'  swap  my  lot  in   life 
Wi'  any  o'  the  wealthy." 

" — Keir.     Arran,  Aug.  i5th,  1912." 

Mere  holiday  jingle,  of  course,  and  meant  only  for 
Tom  Mackley  of  Woolwich,  who  had  sent  the  birthday 
epistle,  but  indicating  that  the  agitator  "off  the  chain" 
was  enjoying  himself. 

The  American  tour,  like  Debs's  candidature  itself, 
was  simply  Socialist  propaganda.  He  addressed  forty- 
four  meetings,  including  four  in  Canada.  He  was  well 
received  everywhere,  and  well  reported  by  the  American 
press.  The  enthusiasm  which  he  aroused  in  such  places 
as  Chicago,  Pittsburg  and  Indianapolis  must  be  taken 
as  a  tribute  to  his  personality,  for  he  was  no  platform 
"spell-binder"  such  as  American  audiences  are  said  to 
be  fond  of.  He  had  never  aspired  to  the  reputation  of 
being  anu  orator.  At  Chicago  he  reminded  his  audience 
of  this.;  "Those  who  know  me  best  are  aware  that  I  am 
never  much  of  an  orator.  If  I  have  any  reputation  at 
all  it  is  not  that  of  a  talker,  but  it  is  rather  this  :  that 
during  the  thirty  odd  years  that  I  have  been  out  in  the 
open  for  the  class  to  which  I  belong,  whether  in  Parlia- 
ment or  out  of  Parliament,  I  Jiave  stood  by  that  class 
through  good  report  and  ill"^J 

A  good  deal  depends  on  what  is  meant  by  oratory. 

319 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

Hardie  could  not  play  upon  the  emotions  of  an  audience 
by  means  of  voice  modulations  and  inflections  and 
dramatic  gestures,  but  he  could,  nevertheless,  sometimes 
set  the  heart  of  his  hearers  beating  in  perfect  tune  with 
that  of  his  own.  He  was  guided  by  no  rules  of  elocution 
except  that  which  enjoins  clear  enunciation.  His  sen- 
tences nearly  always  ended  on  a  rising  note,  which  in 
an  insincere  speaker  would  have  sounded  like  querul- 
ousness,  but  from  his  had  the  effect  of  intense  earnest- 
ness. When  closing  a  speech  on  a  note  of  passionate 
appeal  the  last  word  of  the  last  sentence  would  ring  out 
like  the  sound  of  a  trumpet,  and  call  his  auditors 
involuntarily  to  their  feet ;  they  knew  not  why  except  that 
they  had  to  get  up  and  cheer.  For  lucidity  in  definition 
and  explanation  of  principles  in  oral  speech  he  was 
unrivalled.  He  was  never  obscure.  You  always  knew 
what  he  meant.  Take,  for  example,  the  following 
reference  to  the  State  in  this  same  Chicago  speech  ("The 
syndicalist  starts  from  the  assumption  that  the  State  is 
a  capitalist  institution.  The  State,  however,  is  nothing 
of  the  sort.  At  the  present  time  every  State  in  the  world, 
and  every  kingdom  in  the  world,  is  capitalist.  Why 
is  that  so?  Because  the  workers  elect  the  capitalist 
class  to  govern  the  State.  The  State  its'elf  is  neither 
capitalist  nor  anti-capitalist.  The  State  is  simply  a  good 
old  donkey  that  goes  the  way  its  driver  wants  it  to  go. 
When  the  capitalists  rule,  of  course,  the  State  serves 
the  capitalists.  When  the  workers  get  sense  enough  to 
stop  sending  capitalists,  and  send  Socialists  drawn  from 
their  own  ranks,  to  represent  them,  then  the  State 
becomes  your  servant  and  not  the  servant  of  the 
capitalists." 

He  sent  home,  as  was  his  custom,  a  series  of  articles 
descriptive  of  industrial  and  social  conditions  in 
America,  very  valuable  at  the  time,  but  not  so  interesting 

320 


AMERICA 

for  us  now  as  the  accounts  of  his  meetings  with  old 
friends  from  the  home  country.  At  every  stage  of  his 
journeyings  they  seemed  to  have  gathered  round  him. 
His  tour  took  him  through  many  of  the  coal-mining  dis- 
tricts, and  we  hear  of  social  evenings  with  comrades  of 
his  youth  now,  like  himself,  growing  grey,  but  fain  to 
shake  hands  and  be  merry  with  him  for  auld  lang  syne. 
We  hear  of  "Hardie  singing  'Bonnie  Mary  o'  Argyle' 
and  'Robin  Tamson's  Smiddy,'"  and  of  "big  Bob  Mac- 
beth in  The  Battle  of  Stirling  Brig/  "  and  of  "Barney 
Reilly  dancing  an  Irish  jig  with  as  clean  and  light  a  step 
as  he  did  thirty  years  ago  in  the  'Quarter." 

This  was  Keir  Hardie  as  the  party  politicians  and 
press  interviewers  never  knew  him,  but  as  he  was  known 
in  hundreds  of  I.L.P.  households  throughout  Great 
Britain  and  also  to  the  delegates  at  I.L.P.  conferences 
in  the  social  hours  when  the  day's  work  was  done  and  the 
controversies  forgotten.  On  such  occasion,  to  look  upon 
Keir  Hardie  and  Bruce  Glasier  letting  themselves  go 
in  a  foursome  reel  was,  as  the  Scotch  phrase  has  it,  "a 
sicht  for  sair  een."  This,  his  last  American  trip,  seems 
to  have  given  him  very  great  pleasure,  a  fact  the  know- 
ledge of  which  has  a  measure  of  consolation  for  some 
of  us  who  know  what  time  and  fate  had  in  store 
for  him. 

Hardly  had  he  arrived  home  when  the  Party  was 
called  upon  to  face  the  troubles  for  international 
Socialism  created  by  the  war  in  the  Balkans.  A  special 
international  Congress  had  been  summoned  to  meet  at 
Basle.  The  separate  Balkan  States  had  united  against 
Turkey,  and  there  was  very  great  danger  that  the  war 
would  not  be  confined  to  the  Near  East  and  that  the 
much  dreaded  European  conflagration  would  break  out. 
So  imminent  was  this  possibility  that  the  International 
Socialist  Bureau  had  already  cancelled  the  arrange- 

321 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

ments  for  the  1913  Congress  due  to  take  place  in  Vienna. 
The  contiguity  of  Austria  to  the  theatre  of  war,  and  the 
ambitions  of  its  rulers  and  diplomats  and  its  interests  in 
the  balance  of  power  in  the  Balkans,  made  it  seem  certain 
that,  if  the  struggle  were  prolonged,  Austria  would 
speedily  be  involved  and  would  drag  the  others  in  ajso. 
Europe  was  again  on  the  edge  of  the  precipice.  I  So, 
when  the  Congress  had  to  be  postponed  till  1914,  it 
was  decided  to  call  immediately  an  emergency  Congress 
in  Switzerland.  We  know  what  happened  in  1914,  and 
why  it  came  about  that  this  at  Basle  was  the  very  Jast 
Congress  before  the  break-up  of  the  International,  j  It 
should  be  noted  that  the  British  members  of  the  Inter- 
national Socialist  Bureau  were  strongly  opposed  to  the 
postponement  of  the  1913  Congress  and  were  alone  in 
this  opposition.  Who  can  tell  but  that  if  it  had  'met,  it 
might  have  been  able  to  radiate  sufficient  moral  force 
to  prevent  the  calamity  of  the  following  year?  To  be 
wise  after  the  event  is,  of  course,  easy,  and  these  post- 
war conjectures  may  seem  futile;  yet  it  is  natural  for  us 
to  regret  what  seems  a  lost  opportunity  for  a  last  great 
effort  for  the  prevention  of  the  world-war. 

At  the  Basle  Congress,  twenty-three  countries  were 
represented  by  five  hundred  and  fifty-five  delegates, 
Great  Britain  sending  thirteen.  By  the  time  the  Con- 
gress met,  the  Balkan  States  had  effectually  defeated 
Turkey  and  an  armistice  had  been  declared  with  the 
Balkan  League  holding  the  mastery  of  the  situation. 
This  had  not  lessened  the  danger  of  war  in  Central 
Europe.  Not  only  was  there  the  likelihood  that  in  the 
settlement  the  Great  Powers  would  intervene  and  come 
into  collision  with  each  other,  but  there  was  also  the 
danger,  which  realised  itself  only  too  speedily,  that  the 
victorious  Balkan  States  would  turn  and  rend  each 
other.  The  actors  on  the  Balkan  stage  were  too  much 

322 


THE   BASLE   CONGRESS 

puppets  controlled  by  the  rival  Powers  who  plotted, 
bribed  and  egged  on  from  behind  the  scenes. 

The  Basle  Congress  was  a  magnificently  impressive 
International  Socialist  demonstration  against  war;  but 
that  was  all  it  could  be.  It  drafted  and  issued  a  mani- 
festo to  the  Socialists  of  all  the  countries  represented, 
defining  what  measures  they  might  take  for  the  preserva- 
tion of  peace.  This  manifesto,  the  last  issued  by  any 
authoritative  International  Congress,  might  well  be 
republished.  It  sets  forth  in  vivid  detail  the  conditions 
and  international  relationships  out  of  which  the  .Great 
War  eventuated,  conditions  and  relationships  which,  if 
re-established,  whatever  the  grouping  of  the  different 
interests  may  be,  must  produce  the  same  evil  results. 

There  was  deep  seriousness  at  this  Congress,  and, 
at  the  great  peace  demonstration  in  the  Cathedral,  high 
and  noble  utterances  by  Bebel,  Jaures,  Adler,  Hardie 
and  other  international  representative  men.  It  was  an 
historic  Congress,  in  a  sense  of  which  none  who  partici- 
pated could  have  any  knowledge.  None  of  them  could 
know  that  this  was  the  last.  Nor  could  Bebel  and  Hardie 
know  that  this  was  their  final  meeting.  But  so  it  was, 
Bebel,  now  in  his  seventy-third  year,  had  only  a  few 
more  months  of  life,  and  happily  did  not  see  his  beloved 
German  Social  Democratic  Party  first  voting  war  credits 
and  then  torn  to  pieces.  Hardie  looked  almost  as 
venerable  as  Bebel,  but  had  greater  vigour.  Basle 
wound  up  an  old  generation,  ended  an  old  chapter,  was 
the  close  of  many  hopes. 

The  Rev.  James  Wallace  of  Glasgow,  who  was  one 
of  the  British  delegates,  has  preserved  for  us  a  very 
pleasant  glimpse  of  Hardie  in  the  streets  of  Basle. 
"After  the  excitement  of  the  public  meeting,"  says  Mr. 
Wallace,  "I  accompanied  the  tribune  of  the  people  on  a 
tour  to  see  the  'uncos'  of  Basle,  and,  as  in  Bunyan's 

•323 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

'Pilgrim's  Progress'  Hopeful  had  to  fall  back  on 
Christian  to  translate  the  writing  on  a  pillar  'for  he  was 
learned/  so  I  proved  of  service  to  Keir  Hardie  in  the 
case  of  French  or  German  sentences  and  specially  by 
enabling  him  with  some  ease  to  make  a  purchase  of  a 
keepsake  for  Mrs.  Hardie  in  a  small  jeweller's  shop. 
Blessing  on  the  honest  Swiss  saleswoman  whose  shop 
seemed  so  fragrant  with  honesty  that  we  both  felt  com- 
pletely at  home,  and  the  desire  for  gain  or  profit  was 
simply  nowhere  with  her  compared  with  the  full  play  of 
human  kindliness  and  good  feeling.  Whether  she  recol- 
lects the  two  Scotsmen  or  no,  I  cannot  tell,  but  to  the 
two  Scotsmen  her  shop  with  its  fragrant  honesty  was  a 
green  spot  in  our  memory.  As  we  passed  along  the 
pavements  we  admired  the  noble  street  architecture  of 
the  old  city,  but  Keir  Hardie  was  also  much  interested 
in  all  the  different  kinds  of  dogs,  large  or  small,  that 
crossed  our  paths.  The  most  contemptible  'tykes' 
attracted  the  great  man's  notice.  During  the  whole 
course  of  our  peregrinations  working  men  broke  into 
smiles  at  the  sight  of  Keir  Hardie,  and  kept  him  very 
busy  pulling  off  his  cap  in  reply  to  their  salutations, 
while  an  Egyptian,  with  a  profile  exactly  reproducing 
the  features  of  his  ancestors  on  the  monuments  of  Luxor 
four  thousand  years  ago,  approached  us  with  all  eager- 
ness to  complain  of  the  high-handed  acts  of  British 
officials  in  the  land  of  the  Pharaohs.  Keir  Hardie 
listened  to  him  very  sympathetically  and  offered  to  air 
his  complaint  in  Parliament;  but  so  far  as  I  could  judge 
there  was  a  want  of  definiteness  about  his  statements,  as 
if  they  were  rather  the  expression  of  a  general  restive- 
ness  of  his  country  under  the  regime  of  Britain,  and 
might  even  be  fomented  by  German  intrigue.  Very 
naturally  our  footsteps  gravitated  towards  the  Art 
Gallery  of  Basle.  'There's  Jaures,'  said  Keir  Hardie, 

324 


THE   BASLE   CONGRESS 

and  went  forward  to  shake  the  great  Frenchman's  hand. 
A  man  more  unlike  the  typical  Frenchman  as  depicted 
in  our  comic  papers  it  would  be  impossible  to  find. 
Indeed,  take  a  shrewd  farmer  from  the  Ayr  or  Lanark 
market,  and  there  you  have  a  Jaures.  It  was  the  last 
meeting  of  these  two  great  men  on  earth.  What  sphere 
have  they  now  for  the  exercise  of  their  beautiful  ener- 
gies ?  'We  are  such  stuff  as  dreams  are  made  of.' '  Mr. 
Wallace  was  wrong.  Hardie  and  Jaures  were  to  meet 
again  before  the  end. 

And  so  the  year  1912  drew  towards  its  close,  with 
the  war-clouds  hanging  dark  and  threatening  over  the 
nations,  and  the  minds  of  all  Socialists  full  of  fore- 
boding. "The  moment  is  critical,"  wrote  Hardie,  "and 
European  war  will  almost  certainly  lead  to  European 
revolution,  the  end  of  which  no  man  can  foresee";  yet 
was  he  still  an  optimist.  "It  was  a  great  gathering,"  he 
summed  up,  speaking  of  the  Basle  Congress,  "and  full 
of  significance  for  the  future  of  our  race.  For  those 
gathered  there  represented  not  so  many  nationalities, 
but  the  disinherited  of  all  lands.  These  have  now  no 
country  :  they  are  the  mob,  the  proletariat,  the  oppressed. 
These  are  the  ties  that  bind  them.  The  International 
is  uniting  them  in  their  fight  against  bondage."  He  was 
great  of  heart,  and  he  needed  to  be. 


w  325 


J 


CHAPTER   THIRTEEN 

SOUTH  AFRICA  AND  IRELAND COMING  OF  AGE 

CONFERENCE — THE   WORLD  CONFLICT 

IT  is  not  easy  to  describe  Keir  Hardie's  activities 
during  the  succeeding  eighteen  months  of  turmoil. 
So  many    different  events,  political,  industrial  and 
international,  were  happening  concurrently,  in    all    of 
which  he  was  interested  and  implicated.     Perhaps  the 
simplest  way  will  be  to  take  the  more  outstanding  of 
these  events  in  their  chronological  order. 

At  the  I.L.P.  Annual  Conference  held  at  Manchester, 
in  March,  he  accepted  once  more  the  position  of  Chair- 
man of  the  Party,  the  chief  reason  for  his  election  being 
that  he,  as  founder  of  the  I.L.P.,  might  preside  at  the 
"Coming  of  Age"  Conference  and  celebrations  to  take 
place  the  following  year  at  Bradford.  His  remarks  in 
accepting  the  honour  were  brief  and  characteristic. 
"Twenty  years  ago  I  was  elected  to  the  Chairmanship. 
I  then  said  I  accepted  the  office  reluctantly.  I  say  the 
same  thing  to-day.  Nature  never  intended  me  to  be  a 
leader.  I  find  myself  happier  among  the  rank  and  file. 
But  one  thing  let  us  determine.  During  the  next  twelve 
months  we  are  all  going  to  be  young  men  in  a  hurry." 
In  Parliament  a  fortnight  later,  Hardie  found  himself 
almost  in  the  position  which  he  had  occupied  at  the 
beginning  of  his  parliamentary  career.  He  stood  alone, 
or  nearly  so.  The  occasion  was  the  introduction  of  what 
was  known  as  the  Government's  "Cat  and  Mouse"  Bill, 
the  object  of  which  was  to  enable  the  Home  Secretary 

326 


WOMEN'S  SUFFRAGE 

to  release  suffragist  hunger  strikers  when  they  were  at 
the  point  of  death,  and,  when  they  had  recovered  in 
health,  to  reimprison^hem  without  trial.  Hardie  moved 
the  rejection  of  the  Bill  and  got  only  seven  other 
members  to  follow  him  into  the  lobby.  1  There  was 
magnanimity  as  well  as  courage  in  his  lonely  champion- 
ship of  the  militants. 

Only  a  few  days  before,  these  same  women  had  not 
only  shouted  him  down,  but  had  actually  assaulted  him. 
Hardly  by  a  word  did  he  blame  them.  Nor  did  he  look'"' 
for  gratitude  from  them.  He  opposed  the  Bill  because 
it  was  the  right  thing  to  do,  and  he  opposed  it  with  so 
much  vigour  and  persuasiveness  that  in  the  final  division 
before  it  became  law,  his  seven  supporters  had  increased 
to  fifty,  a  proof  that  he  had  stirred  some  of  the  parlia- 
mentary guardians  of  liberty  to  a  perception  of  the 
danger  of  vesting  such  arbitrary  power  in  the  hands  of 
a  Secretary  of  a  Government  department.  So  far  as  the 
militant  suffragists  were  concerned,  he  appreciated  their 
fighting  spirit,  though  he  deplored  their  lack  of  judgment 
in  the  conduct  of  their  campaign.  The  leaders,  Mrs. 
Pankhurst  and  Mrs.  Pethick  Lawrence,  both  of  whom 
had  suffered  imprisonment,  were,  or  had  been,  his  per- 
sonal friends.  Mrs.  Pankhurst  had  declared  war  on  the 
Labour  Party  because  it  had  declined  to  adopt  the 
policy  of  voting  against  every  Government  measure 
until  the  women's  demands  had  been  conceded,  and,  of 
course,  Hardie,  as  a  member  of  the  Labour  Party,  had 
been  included  in  that  declaration  of  war,  and  treated, 
or  rather  maltreated,  as  if  he  were  a  foe  to  the  suffrage 
movement  instead  of  its  strongest  advocate. 

Recent  developments  had  added  exasperation  to  the 
sense  of  injustice  in  the  minds  of  the  women.  The 
Government  had  introduced  a  Reform  Bill  which  made 
no  provision  for  votes  for  women,  but  had  tacitly  agreed 

327, 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

that  if  amendments  embodying  such  a  provision  were 
carried,  they  would  be  included  in  the  Bill.  There  was 
a  practical  certainty  that  such  amendments,  proposed 
by  the  Labour  Party,  would  be  carried;  but  the  hopes 
thus  raised  had  been  frustrated  by  the  Speaker's  ruling 
that  such  amendments  would  constitute  an  entirely  new 
Bill,  which  would  require  to  be  introduced  anew, 
and  the  Government  t  had  thereupon  abandoned 
the  measure  altogether.  /  The  militant  section,  violent 
in  their  methods  before,"  Were  more  violent  now,  and 
seemed  more  wrathful  even  against  the  Labour  Party 
.  than  against  the  Government,  notwithstanding  that  the 
I.L.P.  Conference  had  pledged  itself  to  oppose  every 
franchise  measure  which  did  not  include  women.  That 
very  Conference  the  militant  women  had  tried  to  wreck, 
and  mobbed  and  hustled  Hardie  and  Snowden.  .He 
did  not  blame  the  women.  He  blamed  the  Government 
which  denied  them  the  rights  of  citizenship,  much  in 
the  same  way  as  he  had  held  that  unemployed  workmen 
could  not  be  expected  to  conform  to  a  system  of  laws 
which  did  not  guarantee  to  them  the  right  to  work.  J  In 
tactics  the  militant  suffragists  were  wrong  :  in  principle 
they  were  right.  It  should  be  said  that  the  tactics  of 
violence  had  never  been  endorsed  by  the  National 
Union  of  Women's  Suffrage  Societies  under  which  the 
majority  of  the  women  were  organised  and  which 
had  supported  the  Labour  Party  throughout  in  its 
methods. 

Early  in  the  month  of  April,  Sir  Edward  Grey  dis- 
closed that  a  European  war  had  again  nearly  broken  out 
over  a  quarrel  between  Montenegro  and  Albania — a  part 
of  the  aftermath  of  the  previous  year's  fighting  in  the 
Balkans.  Only  the  most  meagre  information  was  vouch- 
safed and  no  opportunity  was  provided  for  public  dis- 
cussion. "I  suppose,"  commented  Hardie,  in  his  gravely 

328 


THE   COMING  WAR 

satirical  way — "I  suppose  we  shall  be  allowed  to  say  a 
word  or  two  before  war  begins/'  Put  in  the  past  tense, 
these  words  are  an  accurate  description  of  what  actually 
took  place  sixteen  months  later.  Parliament  was 
allowed  "to  say  a  few  words"  before  the  Great  War 
began.  Responsible  Socialist  leaders  had  certainly  at 
this  time  other  matters  than  the  franchise  question  to 
engross  their  attention. 

In  June,  he  travelled  further  across  Europe  than  he 
had  yet  been,  to  Budapest,  to  attend  the  Annual  Con- 
gress of  the  International  Women's  Suffrage  Alliance, 
not  as  a  delegate,  but  as  a  guest.  This  fact  emphasises 
how  widely  he  was  recognised  as  a  friend  of  the  cause, 
some  of  whose  advocates  in  his  own  country  were  throw- 
ing stones  at  him.  He  found  the  Hungarian  capital  to 
be  a  beautiful  city,  but  a  city  in  which  democracy  could 
hardly  draw  breath.  Trade  Unions  were  tolerated  as 
long  as  they  were  harmless  to  the  employers,  there  was  a 
franchise  which  excluded  the  workers  from  any  share  in 
legislation  or  administration,  and  military  law  was 
dominant  over  all.  Reading  his  description,  we  can 
realise  how  helpless  the  Socialist  elements  would  be  to 
rally  any  anti-war  force,  and  how  the  whole  populace 
would  be  rushed  automatically  into  war  when  the  crisis 
came.  Side  by  side  with  the  autocratic  power,  he  found 
a  certain  amount  of  wisdom  in  the  municipal  manage- 
ment which  made  life  tolerable,  and  there  is  no  indica- 
tion of  any  premonition  of  the  terrible  ordeal  which 
awaited  this  fair  city  on  the  Danube  fated  to  be  scourged 
by  war,  pestilence,  and  famine,  and,  later  on,  by  the 
infamous  White  Terror.  He  visited  Vienna,  where  he 
found  much  the  s;ame  conditions,  and  conferred  with 
Dr.  Adler  and  other  Socialist  leaders,  and  in  Brussels, 
on  the  way  home,  with  Huysmans,  the  subject  of  talk 
between  all  these  representative  Socialists  being,  we 

329 


J 


J.    KEIR  HARDIE 

may  be  sure,  the  ever  darkening  war-cloud  and  the 
possibility  of  dispelling  it. 

He  does  not  seem  to  have  derived  much  benefit  in 
health  from  this  Continental  trip,  as,  almost  immediately 
after  his  return,  he  had  a  temporary  but  rather  alarming 
breakdown.  On  the  last  Friday  in  July,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
W.  C.  Anderson,  on  their  way  to  an  I.L.P.  summer 
conference  at  Keswick,  found  their  leader  in  a  railway- 
carriage  at  Euston  in  a  state  of  acute  exhaustion.  He 
was  due  to  speak  at  Whitehaven  that  evening,  but 
finding  his  condition  so  serious,  Mr.  Anderson  sent  him 
home  in  a  cab,  and  himself  took  his  place  at  Whitehaven. 
Hardie  turned  up  two  days  later  at  Keswick  looking 
very  pale  and  shaken,  but  assuring  his  friends  that  he 
was  all  right.  As  a  matter  of  fact  he  had  very  frequent 
attacks  of  this  kind,  known  only  to  the  friends  with 
whom  he  happened  to  be  staying.  Seldom  did  he 
allow  them  to  prevent  the  fulfilment  of  his  public 
engagements. 

In  Parliament  the  following  week  he  was,  with  Mr. 
(5iithwaite,  demanding  an  inquiry  into  the  industrial 
trouble  which  had  broken  out  in  South  Africa,  and 
incidentally  providing  the  British  public  with  the  finest 
reliable  information  as  to  the  nature  and  cause  of  that 
trouble.  The  Rand  miners  had  at  last  realised  that  the 
conquest  of  South  Africa  had  not  been  undertaken 
primarily  in  their  interests,  and  when  in  order  to  better 
their  working  conditions  they  had  begun  to  organise  and 
to  hold  public  meetings,  they  found  that  the  very  law 
which,  when  passed  by  the  Boer  Government,  was 
declared  to  be  one  of  the  justifications  for  British 
aggression,  was  now  used  to  prevent  British  labour  in 
South  Africa  from  organising  itself.  A  public  meeting 
in  the  Square  at  Johannesburg  had  been  suppressed  by 
armed  force  and  twenty  men  killed  and  one  hundred 

330 


REBEL'S   FUNERAL 

and  fifty  wounded.  The  Governor-General,  Lord 
Gladstone,  had  allowed  himself  to  be  made  the  tool  of 
the  mineowners,  had  given  the  sanction  of  his  authority 
to  the  outrage,  and  had  thereby  brought  dishonour  on 
British  rule  in  South  Africa.  Such,  with  many  addi- 
tional particulars  of  the  evil  conditions  prevailing  in 
the  mines,  was  the  impeachment  put  forward  by  Outh- 
waite  and  Hardie.  The  Government  had  practically 
no  defence,  and  an  inquiry  was  granted,  the  subsequent 
outcome  of  which  is  no  part  of  this  narrative.  What  is 
noteworthy  is  how  instinctively  labour  in  revolt,  whether 
in  South  Africa  or  elsewhere,  looked  to  Hardie  for 
championship.  He  could  always  be  relied  upon.  It 
almost  seemed  as  if  in  this  resolute,  unswerving  man 
the  working-class  struggle  the  world  over  had  become 
personified.  / 

In  August,  Hardie,  with  Socialist  representatives 
from  many  lands,  was  called  to  Zurich  to  the  funeral 
of  Bebel,  whose  place  in  the  German  Socialist  move- 
ment was  very  similar  to  that  of  Hardie  himself  in  this 
country.  Jaures  was  absent  through  ill-health.  The 
public  mourning  for  Bebel,  as  described  by  Hardie, 
must  have  been  deeply  impressive,  but  more  impressive 
to  us  are  Hardie's  simple  words :  "The  end  came 
sudden,  which  at  seventy-three  is  meet  and  proper.  In 
the  evening  he  retired  to  rest,  apparently  in  his  usual 
health,  and  ere  the  morning  he  had  entered  upon  the 
rest  everlasting.  What  now  remains  is  but  the  memory 
of,the  mighty  life,  and  the  calm,  peaceful  death." 
fin  the  first  week  of  September  he  was  in  Dublin  at 
tEe  invitation  of  the  Irish  Transport  Workers'  Federa- 
tion investigating  the  cause  of  the  serious  disturbances 
in  that  city,  the  memory  of  which  has  been  dimmed  by 
the  subsequent  more  terrible  happenings  with  which 
we  are  all  too  familiar.  Indeed,  the  events  of  that 

33 * 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

time — outrageous  though  they  were — seem  now  like  a 
mere  dress  rehearsal  for  what  was  to  follow.  The  city 
was  given  over  to  "Castle"  rule,  administered  by  the 
R.I.C.  which  was  almost  equivalent  to  being  placed 
under  military  law.  As  at  Johannesburg,  public 
meetings  were  forcibly  suppressed  and  lives  lost  in  the 
course  of  the  suppression.  The  organiser  of  the 
Transport  Workers'  Union,  Jim  Larkin,  was  arrested 
on  a  charge  of  sedition,  which,  as  Hardie  pointed  out, 
could,  if  upheld,  be  construed  to  apply  to  the  whole 
of  Trade  Union  activity.  "There  never  was  a  meeting 
held  in  connection  with  a  strike  or  a  Labour  dispute  in 
which  the  same  charge  could  not  have  held  good/'  This 
was  not  the  "Irish  Question"  as  the  politicians  under- 
stand it.  It  was  not  England  versus  Ireland.  It  was 
Capital  versus  Labour,  and  was  in  reality  an  attempt  on 
the  part  of  the  employers,  directed  by  W.  M.  Murphy, 
an  Irish  capitalist,  to  destroy  organised  labour  in 
Ireland  before  it  became  too  strong.  In  six  years' 
time,  Larkin,  a  man  of  volcanic  energy,  had  achieved 
something  like  a  miracle.  The  Irish  industrial  workers 
were  already  nation-conscious.  He  had  made  them  also 
class-conscious,  and  had  brought  into  existence  a  force 
which,  in  the  event  of  Home  Rule  being  established, 
boded  ill  for  capitalism  in  Ireland.  Larkin  was  the 
leader,  the  inspirer,  of  the  new  movement;  but  there  was 
another  quieter,  brainier,  but  equally  determined  man, 
James  Connolly  by  name.  These  two  were  creating  an 
organisation  and  a  spirit  which  was  at  once  Nationalist 
and  Socialist,  and  a  mutual  instinct  of  self-preservation 
made  Dublin  Castle,  the  army  in  occupation,  and 
Murphy,  the  capitalist  Nationalist,  join  forces  for  the 
destruction  of  this  new  phenomenon. 

Hardie   knew   well   how  dangerous  it  was  for   any 
British-born   agitator   to  obtrude    in   Irish    affairs,    but 

332 


IRELAND 

nevertheless  declared  it  to  be  the  duty  of  British  Trade 
Unionists  to  take  part  in  the  resistance  to  what  he 
described  as  "a  conspiracy  to  destroy  the  Trade  Union 
movement."  He  protested  against  the  Government 
taking  sides  with  the  employers,  and  pointed  out  that, 
at  that  very  moment,  Carson  and  F.  E.  Smith  were 
fomenting  rebellion  in  the  North  of  Ireland  with 
apparently  the  approval  of  Dublin  Castle.  From 
Dublin  he  passed  to  Belfast  where  he  addressed  a 
meeting  under  the  auspices  of  .the  I.L.P.  and  sought  to 
convince  the  Trade  Unionists  of  the  North  that  it  was 
their  duty  to  make  common  cause  with  their  fellow  Trade 
Unionists  in  the  South  and  West.  J 

The  week  following  he  was  at  Jena  as  the  fraternal 
delegate  from  the  British  Labour  Party  to  the  German 
Socialist  Congress,  his  real  object  being  as  ever,  to 
assist,  if  only  by  the  weight  of  a  single  word,  in  con- 
solidating the  International  Socialist  forces  against 
war.  [jn  his  greetings  to  the  Congress  he  restated 
practically  his  whole  Socialist  and  anti-militarist  creed. 
"In  these  days  of  international  commerce,  finance,  art, 
literature,  and  the  increasing  solidarity  of  the  working- 
class  movement  of  the  world,  the  rulers  and  statesmen 
of  Europe  could,  had  they  the  will,  abolish  armies  and 
navies  in  one  generation.  We  could  at  least  easily  have 
the  United  States  of  Europe  in  that  time,  but  they  do  not 
want  to.  Their  rule  is  founded  on  the  sword,  and,  were 
that  to  be  abolished,  the  democracies  of  the  world  would 
soon  abolish  class  rule.  In  the  Socialist  parties  there  is 
growing  up  a  State  within  the  State.  The  new  State 
will  not  be  based^on  force,  but  on  economic  equality  and 
personal  liberty.^/ 

He  does  not  seem  to  have  been  much  impressed  with 
the  proceedings  at  the  German  Congress,  and  was 
disappointed  that  the  general  strike  idea  had  not  yet 

333 


J 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

been  embodied  in  any  practical  proposal,  whilej  in  the 
friction  between  the  Christian  Unions  and  the  bocial 
Democratic  Unions,  he  saw  a  fatal  obstacle  to  unity  at 
a  time  when  unity  was  the  one  thing  needful,  j  He  knew 
from  experience  not  so  far  away  as  Germany  the  evil 
consequences  of  sectarian  differences.  Thus  the  weeks 
and  months  passed,  every  day  full  of  strife  and  agitation, 
the  year  closing  with  a  national  I.L.P.  campaign  against 
Conscription,  in  which,  as  usual,  Hardie  took  a  leading 
part,  and  with  another  impressive  international  demon- 
stration in  London  with  Adler,  Vandervelde,  Jaures, 
Hardie  all  delivering  the  same  message,  these  four 
standing  side  by  side  almost  for  the  last  time.  The  year 
of  the  Great  War  was  at  hand. 

And  yet  it  seemed  as  if  the  danger  had  receded. 
These  distinguished  foreigners  were  in  London  to 
attend  the  meetings  of  the  International  Socialist 
Bureau,  the  chief  business  of  which  was  to  arrange  for 
the  postponed  International  Congress,  which  it  was,  after 
all,  decided  could  be  held  in  Vienna.  In  the  minds  of 
these  men  the  danger  of  European  war  had,  for  the  time 
being,  vanished,  else  they  woul.d  not  have  been  arranging 
for  Vienna  in  August,  1914.  When  August  came,  Vienna 
was  the  scene  of  a  congress  of  another  kind — a  congress 
of  armed  men.  The  conscripts  were  then  mustering  and 
were  being  marched  out  into  Hell. 

While  in  London  the  Socialist  Bureau  lent  its  influence 
on  behalf  of  the  movement  for  Socialist  unity  in  this 
country  which  seemed  now  at  last  on  the  point  of  being 
achieved.  This,  also,  the  war  rendered  impossible. 

|  The  springtime  of  1914  was  a  time  of  great  satisfaction 
for  Keir  Hardie.  It  brought  him  a  sense  of  achievement. 
The  Independent  Labour  Party  had  existed  for  twenty- 
one  years.  It  was  now  a  power  in  the  land.  It  had 
created  a  political  Labour  Party  expressive  of  working- 

334 


"COMING   OF  AGE" 

class  ideals,  and  its  principles  were  accepted  by  the 
great  Trade  Union  movement.  In  all  this  his  own 
personal  effort  was  manifest.  His  had  been  the  guiding 
hand,  not  always  visible,  but  always  operating.  The 
influence  of  the  I.L.P.  was  apparent,  not  only  in 
Parliament,  but  in  every  sphere  and  phase  of  local 
government.  In  Town  Councils,  County  Councils, 
Parish  Councils  and  School  Boards,  members  of  the 
Independent  Labour  Party  were  at  work,  and  the  effect 
of  their  presence  was  already  beginning  to  humanise 
the  administrative  work  of  these  bodies.  Almost 
imperceptibly,  a  new  collectivist  spirit  was  permeating 
the  public  life  of  the  country,  and  a  consciousness  of 
power  was  growing  amongst  the  working  class.  In  all 
this  the  Independent  Labour  Party  had  been  the  driving 
and  the  inspiring  element.  The  very  fact  that  it  was 
the  mark  for  special  attack  by  the  vested  interests  was 
the  proof  of  this.  Many  times  during  those  twenty-one 
years  the  capitalist  press  had  exulted  in  the  appearance 
of  division,  and  had  gloated  over  the  coming  disruption — 
which  never  came.  It  was  now  celebrating  its  "coming 
of  age"  as  a  political  party,  and  the  man  who  presided  \f 
over  it  on  the  day  of  its  birth  was  presiding  over  it  now. 
Keir  Hardie,  like  the  Party,  had  survived  through  abuse, 
ridicule  and  misrepresentation.  He  was  able,  literally, 
to  look  upon  his  handiwork  and  find  that  it  was  good. 
To  consolidate  organised  Labour  and  shape  it  into  an 
invincible  power  for  the  realisation  of  Socialism.  That 
was  his  purpose.  Only  a  beginning  had  been  made,  but 
it  was  a  good  beginning.  A  path  had  been  cleared 
along  which  others  might  follow?} 

It  was  in  something  of  this  spirit  that  the  I.L.P.  met 
at  Bradford,  the  place  of  its  birth.  Congratulations  came 
from  every  Labour  organisation  in  Britain  and  from 
every  Socialist  Party  in  the  world.  From  many  of  these 

335 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

also  came  delegates  in  person.  Camelinat,  who  had 
been  a  member  of  the  First  International  and  Treasurer 
to  the  Government  of  the  Paris  Commune,  beaming  over 
with  kindliness,  gave  his  blessing  to  the  I.L.P.  pioneers 
for  liberty.  Huysmans,  of  the  Second  International, 
told  how  the  great  fraternity  of  Socialist  effort  was 
growing  in  all  lands,  and  paid  tribute  to  the  Independent 
Labour  Party's  share  in  that  work.  Herman  Muller,  of 
Germany,  spoke  in  the  same  hopeful  strain.  There  was 
eloquent  speech-making  and  brave  and  stirring  music, 
including  a  Song  of  Liberty,  specially  composed  for 
the  occasion  by  Granville  Bantock  to  words  written  by 
Mrs.  Bantock.  The  early  pioneers  of  the  Party  were 
much  in  evidence;  Robert  Smillie,  Fred  Jowett,  M.P., 
Bruce  Glasier,  Mrs.  Glasier,  with  many  a  rank-and-file 
delegate  from  the  first-year  branches  of  the  Party, 
fighting  their  battles  over  again.  The  general  feeling 
was  one  of  confidence  and  optimism,  and  for  the  moment, 
at  least,  they  had  put  out  of  their  hearts  and  minds  the 
fear  of  war.  Even  Hardie's  presidential  address  made 
no  reference  to  the  European  spectre.  He  looked  to 
the  past  and  to  the  future,  and  if  for  that  future  he  had 
any  fears,  he  kept  them  to  himself.  "The  past  twenty- 
one  years,"  he  said,  "have  been  years  of  continuous 
progress,  but  we  are  only  at  the  beginning.  The 
emancipation  of  the  worker  has  still  to  be  achieved,  and 
just  as  the  I.L.P.  in  the  past  has  given  a  good,  straight 
lead,  so  shall  the  I.L.P.  in  the  future,  through  good 
report  and  ill,  pursue  the  even  tenour  of  its  way,  until 
the  sunshine  of  Socialism  and  human  freedom  breaks 
forth  upon  the  land." 

It  was  a  rejoiceful  time  for  the  I.L.P.  marred  only 
slightly  by  attempted  outbreaks  of  violence  from  the  mili- 
tant suffragists,  and  even  they,  could  they  have  peered  in- 
to the  near  future,  would  probably  have  held  their  hands. 

336 


"COMING   OF   AGE" 

Hardie's  closing  words  in  vacating  the  chair  constitute 
the  most  self-revealing  public  utterance  he  ever  made, 
and    as    they   have    also    a    bearing    on    present — and 
probably  future — developments  within  the  I.L.P.,  it  is 
well  that   they  should   be   preserved.     They  are    also 
biographical,  in  the  truest  sense  of  the  word.     "I  think 
I  have  shown  that    I  can  be  a  pioneer,  but  I   am  not 
guided   so  much  by  a  consideration  of  policy,  or  by 
thinking  out  a  long  sequence  of  events,  as  by  intuition 
and  inspiration.     I  know  what  I  believe  to  be  the  right 
thing  and  I  go  and  do  it.     If  I  had,  twenty-one  years 
ago,  stopped  to  think  about  what  the  future  would  bring, 
I  would  not  have  dared  to  accept  the  responsibility  of 
entering  the  House  of  Commons.      During   those  first 
three  years  my  wife  kept  my  house   going,  kept  my 
children  decently  and  respectably  clothed  and   fed  on 
an    income    which    did    not    even    exceed    twenty-five 
shillings  a  week.    Comrades,  you  do  well  to  honour  her. 
Never,  even  in  those  days,  did   she  offer  one   word  of 
reproof.     Many  a  bitter  tear  she  shed,  but  one  of  the 
proud  boasts  of  my  life  is  to  be  able  to  say  that  if  she 
has  suffered  much  in  health  and  in  spirit,  never  has  she 
reproached  me  for  what  I  have  done  for  the  cause  I  love. 
I  leave  the  chair,  then,  as  I  did  at  the  end  of  the  first 
Conference,  to  be  a  pioneer.     I  said  the  other  day  that 
those   of   us   who   are   advanced   in    years  may   easily 
become  cumberers  of  the  ground.      I  am  not  going  to 
die  if  I  can  help  it,  but  there  is  a  dead  spirit  which  blocks 
the  path  of  the  young.    I  am  not  going  to  stand  in  their 
way.   I  shall  die,  as  I  have  lived,  a  member  of  the  I.L.P., 
but  I  want  the  Party  to  have  freedom   to  grow,  and  I 
do  not  want  young  men  and  women  to  say,  'We  might 
have  done  this  or  that  if  it  had  not  been  for  old  Keir.' 
I  will  accept  no  position  which  will  give   me  standing 
over  you.     I  will  fight  for  what  I  think  the  right  thing, 

337 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

but  I  will  trust  your  judgment.  While  I  have  anything 
to  give,  it  shall  be  given  ungrudgingly  to  the  child  of 
my  life— the  I.L.P." 

This  was  Easter,  1914.  The  delegates  returned  to 
their  districts  to  report  the  proceedings  to  their  branches 
and  to  prepare  for  the  usual  summer  propaganda  work 
and  for  the  coming  general  election  which  was  expected 
before  the  end  of  the  year.  The  possibility  of  war  did 
not  enter  into  their  calculations.  Indeed,  it  is  a  remark- 
able fact  that  the  great  upheaval,  so  long  feared  and 
dreaded  and  prophesied,  came  at  the  last  unexpectedly, 
almost  like  a  thief  in  the  night,  and  gave  the  democracies 
of  the  various  countries  no  time  to  organise  any 
resistance,  much  less  to  collaborate  internationally  on  a 
common  policy.  The  people  of  this  country  were  not 
dreaming  of  any  European  War  in  which  they  would 
possibly  be  involved.  On  the  Saturday  and  Sunday— 
twenty-four  hours  before  Sir  Edward  Grey  made  his 
fateful  speech  which  brought  the  war  spirit  into  the 
heart  of  the  country — there  could  be  seen  on  the  London 
streets  groups  of  men  and  women  on  their  way  to 
Germany  to  convey  to  the  German  workers  the  fraternal 
greetings  of  groups  of  British  Adult  Schools  and  of 
British  citizens  innocent  of  what  had  gone  on  behind  the 
scenes. 

So  far  as  politics  were  concerned,  people  were 
deeply  interested  in  two  subjects  only.  One  was  the 
increasingly  outrageous  lawlessness  of  the  militant 
suffragists.  The  other  was  the  threatened  Ulster 
rebellion  in  resistance  to  the  Home  Rule  Act  due  to 
be  put  in  operation  shortly.  Shiploads  of  ammunition  — 
said  to  have  been  imported  from  Germany — had  been 
landed  in  Ireland  for  the  arming  of  the  Ulster  Volun- 
teers. Certain  officers  of  high  rank,  responsible  for  the 
control  of  the  military  forces  in  Ireland,  had  let  it  be 

338 


THE   WORLD   CONFLICT 

known  that  they  could  not  be  relied  upon  to  act  against 
the  Ulster  rebels,  and  to  the  threat  of  rebellion  there 
was  thus  added  the  threat  of  mutiny,  and  though  these 
officers  had  somewhat  modified  their  mutinous  declara- 
tions, the  utterances  of  such  politicians  as  Sir  Edward 
Carson,  F.  E.  Smith  and  Bonar  Law  were  the  reverse  of 
reassuring.  The  situation  was  regarded  as  serious.  The 
people  of  this  country  were  more  concerned  about  the 
Curragh  of  Kildare  than  about  the  Market  Square  of 
Sarajevo. 

The  Socialist  movement,  too,  was,  as  has  been 
indicated,  for  the  time  off  guard.  Philip  Snowden,  in 
rather  poor  health,  went  off  with  Mrs.  Snowden  on  a 
world  tour.  If  he  had  thought  so  great  a  crisis  was  immi- 
nent he  would  certainly  have  stayed  at  home.  Even  the 
assassination  of  the  Austrian  Grand  Duke  at  Sarajevo 
did  not  awaken  serious  apprehension  of  a  general  Euro- 
pean war,  though  such  a  possibility  was  not  absent  from 
the  minds  of  the  I.L.P.  leaders.  That  possibility  was 
indicated  in  an  article  by  W.  C.  Anderson  in  the  "Labour 
Leader"  of  July  3Oth,  but  even  at  that  late  date  he  felt 
justified  in  writing  :  "Despite  all  signs  to  the  contrary, 
there  will,  I  believe,  be  no  war;  nothing,  at  any  rate, 
in  the  nature  of  extended  warfare."  And  so  was  it  with 
the  international  movement. 

On  July  29th,  the  International  Socialist  Bureau 
met  at  Brussels,  hurriedly  summoned  to  consider  the 
state  of  matters  created  by  Austria's  declaration  of  war 
on  Servia.  "But,"  says  Bruce  Glasier  who  was  present 
with  Hardie  and  Dan  Irving  from  Britain,  "although 
the  dread  peril  of  a  general  eruption  of  war  in  Europe 
was  the  main  subject  of  the  deliberations,  no  one,  not  even 
the  German  representatives,  seemed  apprehensive  of  an 
actual  rupture  between  the  great  Powers  taking  place 
until  at  least  the  full  resources  of  diplomacy  had  been 

339 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

exhausted."  So  little  was  a  general  European  war 
expected  that  it  was  decided  to  go  on  with  the  Inter- 
national Congress,  only  changing  the  place  of  meeting 
from  Vienna  to  Paris  because  of  the  state  of  war  in 
Austria,  and  fixing  the  date  for  August  Qth  instead  of 
the  23rd,  the  original  date.  By  August  9th,  neither  Paris 
nor  any  capital  in  Europe  could  give  hospitality  to  an 
International  Socialist  Congress. 

In  the  evening  after  this  Bureau  meeting  in  Brussels, 
a  great  anti-war  meeting,  attended  by  7,0x30  people,  was 
held  in  the  Cirque.  Vandervelde,  of  Belgium,  presided. 
Haase,  of  Germany,  Jaures,  of  France,  Hardie,  of 
Britain,  all  spoke  movingly.  Jaures,  in  this  last  speech  he 
was  ever  to  make,  warmly  thanked  the  German  Social 
Democrats  for  their  splendid  demonstrations  in  favour 
of  peace,  and  with  impassioned  eloquence  invoked  the 
workers  to  rescue  once  and  for  ever  civilisation  from  the 
appalling  disaster  of  war. 

Forty-eight  hours  later  Jaures  himself  fell,  not  by 
the  hand  of  a  German,  but  of  a  fellow-countryman, 
inflamed,  it  was  said,  by  war  madness,  though  to  this 
hour  no  serious  attempt  has  been  made  to  discover 
whether  any  other  motive  power  directed  the  assassin's 
arm.  It  was  here  then,  in  Brussels,  that  Hardie  and 
Jaures  met  and  parted  for  the  last  time.  It  was  in 
Brussels  that  on  this,  the  very  eve  of  Armageddon,  the 
citizens,  men  and  women  in  their  thousands,  marched 
through  the  streets  displaying  their  white  cards  with  the 
strange  device,  "Guerre  a  la  Guerre"  (war  against  war). 
We  know  what  happened  to  Brussels  in  the  time  that 
was  near  at  hand. 

Yet,  still  there  was  hope,  amounting  almost  to  a 
belief,  that  the  crisis  would  pass.  Assuredly  in  Great 
Britain  that  was  the  prevalent  conviction,  and  it  was 
only  when  it  was  realised  that  Russia  was  mobilising 

340 


THE   WORLD   CONFLICT 

her  troops,  and  massing  them  where,  in  time  of  peace, 
no  Russian  troops  should  be,  and  that  German  forces 
were  threateningly  near  to  the  Belgian  frontier,  that  the 
people  of  this  country  woke  up  to  a  real  sense  of  peril, 
and  it  must  be  said  that  they  did  not  wake  up  with  any 
enthusiasm.  The  common  people  did  not  enter  into 
war.  They  were  dragged  into  it.  That  they  could  be 
dragged  into  it  was  due  to  the  fact  that  they  had  been 
kept  wholly  ignorant  of  the  doings  of  their  diplomatists, 
and  they  had  not  believed  the  I.L.P.  when  it  tried  to 
inform  them.  The  I.L.P.  now,  and  up  to  the  last 
possible  moment,  directed  all  its  efforts  towards  keeping 
the  nation  out  of  the  war. 

With  a  spontaneity  which  was  a  striking  proof  of  how 
surely  rooted  in  principle  was  the  organisation,  every 
section  of  it  moved  in  the  same  way.  The  National 
Council,  the  Divisional  Councils,  the  Federations,  the 
branches — even  the  smallest  and  most  isolated  of  these — 
acted  as  by  a  common  impulse ;  and  on  Sunday,  August 
2nd,  in  every  city,  town  and  village  where  there  was  a 
branch  or  group  of  the  Independent  Labour  Party, 
a  public  protest  against  the  nation  being  dragged  into 
the  war  was  made,  and  a  demand  that  whatever  might 
happen  in  Europe,  this  country  should  stand  neutral 
and  play  the  part  of  peacemaker.  Hardie,  if  he  had 
time  to  think  of  it— which  he  probably  had  not — had 
reason  to  be  proud  of  his  beloved  I.L.P.  that  day. 

He  himself  was  in  Trafalgar  Square  taking  part  in 
a  demonstration  organised  by  the  British  Section  of  the 
Internationaj  Socialist  Bureau,  of  which  he  was  Chair- 
man. The  Bureau  had  already  issued  a  Manifesto 
which  is  here  reproduced  for  two  reasons,  first,  because 
Hardie  was  one  of  the  signatories,  second,  because  it  is 
important  to  preserve  this  documentary  proof  that 
organised  labour  in  this  country  was  unitedly  opposed 

x  341 


J.    KEIR  HARDIE 

to  the  war.  Had  it  continued  to  be  so  after  war  was 
declared,  history  would  to-day  have  had  a  different  and 
better  story  to  tell  than  it  can  now  present  to  posterity. 
The  Manifesto  was  as  follows  :— 

"AN  APPEAL  TO  THE  BRITISH 
WORKING  CLASS. 

"(Manifesto   by    British    Section   of   the    International 
Socialist  Bureau.) 

"The  long-threatened  European  war  is  now  upon  us. 
For  more  than  a  hundred  years  no  such  danger  has 
confronted  civilisation.  It  is  for  you  to  take  full  account 
of  the  desperate  situation  and  to  act  promptly  and 
vigorously  in  the  interests  of  peace. 

"You  have  never  been  consulted  about  the  war. 
Whatever  may  be  the  rights  and  the  wrongs  of  the  sudden 
crushing  attack  made  by  the  Militarist  Empire  of  Austria 
upon  Servia,  it  is  certain  that  the  workers  of  all  countries 
likely  to  be  drawn  into  the  conflict  must  strain  every 
nerve  to  prevent  their  Governments  from  committing 
them  to  war. 

"Everywhere  Socialists  and  the  organised  forces  of 
Labour  are  taking  this  course.  Everywhere  vehement 
protests  are  made  against  the  greed  and  intrigues  of 
militarists  and  armament-mongers. 

"We  call  upon  you  to  do  the  same  here  in  Great 
Britain  upon  an  even  more  impressive  scale.  Hold  vast 
demonstrations  in  London  and  in  every  industrial  centre. 
Compel  those  of  the  governing  class  and  their  press, 
who  are  eager  to  commit  you  to  co-operate  with  Russian 
despotism,  to  keep  silence  and  respect  the  decision  of 
the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  people,  who  will  have 
neither  part  not  lot  in  such  infamy.  The  success  of 
Russia  at  the  present  day  would  be  a  curse  to  the  world. 
"There  is  no  time  to  lose.  Already,  by  secret  agree- 

342 


THE    WORLD    CONFLICT 

ments  and  understandings  of  which  the  democracies  of 
the  civilised  world  know  only  by  rumour,  steps  are  being 
taken  which  may  fling  us  all  into  the  fray.  Workers, 
stand  together  therefore  for  peace.  Combine  and 
conquer  the  militarist  enemy  and  the  self-seeking 
Imperialists  to-day  once  and  for  all. 

"Men  and  women  of  Britain,  you  have  now  an 
unexampled  opportunity  of  showing  your  power,  render- 
ing a  magnificent  service  to  humanity  and  to  the  world. 
Proclaim  that  for  you  the  days  of  plunder  and  butchery 
have  gone  by.  Send  messages  of  peace  and  fraternity 
to  your  fellows  who  have  less  liberty  than  you. 

"Down  with  class  rule  !  Down  with  the  rule  of  brute 
force  !  Down  with  war  !  Up  with  the  peaceful  rule  of 
the  people  ! 

"Signed  on  behalf  of  the  British  Section  of  the 
International  Socialist  Bureau, 

"J.  KEIR  HARDIE  (Chairman). 
"ARTHUR  HENDERSON  (Secretary)." 

There  is  a  strange  ring  about  that  appeal  now.  It 
still  seemed  as  if  organised  Labour  would  hold  together 
for  the  preservation  of  peace,  or  for  its  speedy  restoration 
if  war  should  come.  But  it  was  too  late.  The  country 
was  in  the  rapids  and  was  being  rushed  to  the  doom  of 
the  waterfall.  Within  twenty-four  hours  both  temper  and 
outlook  had  changed.  The  heavy  blares  of  the  war 
trumpets  were  beginning  to  perform  their  magic. 

The  Trafalgar  Square  demonstration,  which  the 
"Manchester  Guardian"  described  as  "the  biggest  held  for 
years,"  was  representative  of  all  sections,  as  is  shown  by 
the  list  of  speakers,  which  included  Mr.  J.  Stokes,  Chair- 
man of  the  London  Trades  Council ;  George  Lansbury, 
now  of  the  "Daily  Herald";  Robert  Williams,  of 
the  Transport  Workers'  Federation;  Will  Thorne,  M.P., 

343 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 

of  the  General  Labourers'  Union;  Mary  R.  Macarthur, 
of  the  Federation  of  Women  Workers;  Margaret  Bond- 
field,  of  the  Shop  Assistants'  Union;  Dr.  Marion  Phillips, 
of  the  Women's  Labour  League;  Herbert  Burrows,  of 
the  British  Socialist  Party;  Keir  Hardie,  of  the  I.L.P.; 
Arthur  Henderson,  of  the  National  Labour  Party;  Mrs. 
Despard  and  Mr.  Cunninghame  Graham.  The  latter 
gentleman's  speech  was  said  to  have  made  the  most 
profound  impression,  and  to  have  been  "the  best  he  had 
ever  delivered,"  which  was  saying  a  great  deal.  "Do 
not,"  he  implored,  "let  us  do  this  crime,  or  be  parties  to 
the  misery  of  millions  who  have  never  done  us  harm." 

In  another  part  of  the  country  Robert  Smillie  said 
that  if  it  were  yet  possible  to  stop  the  war  by  a  cessation 
of  work  all  over  Europe  he  would  be  glad  to  pledge  the 
miners  to  such  a  course.  On  August  2nd,  labour  was 
against  the  war. 

On  the  following  night  interest  was  transferred  to  the 
House  of  Commons,  and  Parliament  was  "allowed  to 
say  a  few  words"  before  the  war,  already  decided  upon, 
really  started  officially. 

The  few  words,  from  the  I.L.P.  point  of  view,  were 
spoken  with  unmistakable  emphasis  by  MacDonald  and 
Hardie.  Never  did  speakers  speak  under  difficulties 
like  those  men.  The  facts  had  not  been  disclosed ;  the 
crowded  House  was  in  a  frenzy  and  wished  to  listen  to 
no  reason.  "I  think,"  said  MacDonald,  "Sir  Edward 
Grey  is  wrong.  I  think  the  Government  which  he 
represents  and  for  which  he  speaks  is  wrong.  I  think 
the  verdict  of  history  will  be  that  they  are  wrong.  There 
has  been  no  crime  committed  by  statesmen  of  this 
character  without  these  statesmen  appealing  to  their 
nation's  honour.  We  fought  the  Crimean  War  because 
of  our  honour.  We  rushed  to  South  Africa  because  of 
our  honour.  The  right  hon.  gentleman  is  appealing  to 

344 


THE    WORLD    CONFLICT 

us  to-day  because  of  our  honour.  So  far  as  we  are 
concerned,  whatever  may  happen,  whatever  may  be  said 
about  us,  whatever  attacks  may  be  made  upon  us,  we 
will  say  that  this  country  ought  to  have  remained  neutral, 
because  we  believe  in  the  deepest  part  of  our  hearts  that 
is  right,  and  that  that  alone  is  consistent  with  the  honour 
of  the  country." 

Hardie,  some  time  later  on  in  the  debate,  made  a 
speech  of  extraordinary  dignity  and  earnestness. 
Addressing  himself  in  the  first  place  to  the  consequences 
rather  than  the  causes  of  the  war,  he  impressed  everyone 
with  a  sense  of  the  extent  of  the  distress  that  might  be 
expected.  Unemployment  would  spread  and,  lacking 
wages,  the  poor  would  be  robbed  by  the  manipulators  of 
the  various  food  rings.  He  darkened  the  picture  of 
suffering  as  only  one  could  who  had  seen  it  so  frequently. 
"How,"  he  asked,  "were  the  Government  going  to 
relieve  it?"  He  pointed  out  that  earlier  in  the  sitting  a 
Bill  to  help  the  bankers  had  been  rushed  through  all  its 
stages  by  the  Government.  Where  was  the  Bill  to  help 
the  workers?  He  passionately  denied  that  the  mass  of 
the  workers  of  the  country  were  for  war.  "Had  they 
been  consulted,  war  would  not  have  happened.  Why 
were  not  they  consulted?" 

Both  MacDonald  and  Hardie  knew  only  too  well  that 
their  speeches  and  protestations  were  now  in  vain.  They 
had  made  these  protestations  years  before,  when  they 
ought  not  to  have  been  in  vain.  What  they  were  doing 
now  was  to  clear  themselves  and  their  Party  from 
responsibility  for  the  crime,  and,  if  possible,  hold  the 
Labour  movement  of  this  country  true  and  faithful  to  the 
spirit  and  pledge  of  International  Socialism.  It  was  a 
tremendous  ordeal  for  both,  but  especially  for  Hardie, 
who  was  the  older  man,  and  physically  unwell,  and  only 
sustained  against  collapse  by  the  intensity  of  the  crisis, 

345 


J.    KEIR   BARDIE 

which  made  him  forgetful  of  bodily  infirmity.  These 
had  been  two  weeks  of  terrible  strain.  The  critical 
Conference  at  Brussels;  the  emotional  experience  of 
that  great  public  gathering  there ;  the  murder  of  Jaures, 
revealing,  as  by  a  flash  from  the  fires  of  hell,  the 
potential  horrors  opening  out  upon  humanity;  the  I.L.P. 
Council  deliberations;  the  Labour  Party  Executive 
meetings ;  the  Socialist  Bureau's  meetings  and  decisions ; 
the  Trafalgar  Square  demonstration ;  and  now,  this  last 
solemn  hour  in  the  House  of  Commons.  The  wonder 
is  that  he  was  able  to  pass  through  it,  and  that  he  did 
not  break  down  then  instead  of  a  year  later.  There  are 
occasions  for  some  men  when  the  spirit  triumphs  over 
time  and  circumstance  and  fate  itself.  But  for  such  men 
the  penalty  in  pain  is  very  great. 

Hardie  had  yet  another  ordeal  to  pass  through,  and 
he  resolved  to  face  it  at  once  before  going  home  to  the 
quietness  of  Cumnock.  He  had  to  see  his  constituents. 
He  knew  well  that  the  drums  of  war  that  were  already 
beating  would,  in  proportion,  as  they  roused  national 
pride  and  prejudice,  drown  reason,  and  that  if  he  was 
to  get  a  chance  to  explain  his  position  it  would  have  to 
be  immediately.  (On  August  6th,  he  spoke  in  Aberclare. 
What  happened  mere  had  best  be  described  by  one  who 
was  present.  "As  soon  as  the  hall  began  to  fill  it  was 
obvious  that  a  large  hostile  element  was  present.  There 
was  no  disturbance  when  Hardie,  Richardson  and  the 
Chairman,  Councillor  Stonelake,  mounted  on  the  plat- 
form. The  Chairman  spoke  without  interruption,  but  as 
soon  as  he  called  on  Hardie  the  uproar  commenced.  A 
well  organised  body  of  men  had  taken  up  a  strong 
position  near  the  back  of  the  hall,  a  huge  dreary  building, 
which  was  usually  the  local  market.  They  were  the 
members  of  the  Conservative  and  the  Liberal  Clubs  who 
had  always  hated  Hardie.  Their  opportunity  had  come 

346 


THE    WORLD    CONFLICT 

at  last.  'God  Save  the  King'  and  'Rule  Britannia' 
were  sung  lustily,  and  the  clang  of  a  bell  could  be  heard 
amongst  the  general  pandemonium.  The  crowd  in  the 
front  attempted  to  quell  the  disturbance.  It  soon  became 
evident  that  Keir  Hardie  was  not  going  to  be  heard 
that  night.  Hardie  continued  to  speak  for  about  half  an 
hour  utterly  undaunted  by  the  noise,  but  his  voice  could 
not  be  heard  further  than  the  front  seats.  Once  or  twice 
a  few  scraps  of  phrases  could  be  heard  amidst  the  din. 
He  was  heard  to  refer  to  the  German  workers  as  good, 
kind  natured  people  and  the  noise  drowned  the  rest.  At 
last  he  sat  down.  Richardson  met  with  a  similar  reception 
and  soon  gave  it  up.  A  Union  Jack  was  displayed,  but 
it  soon  disappeared.  Evan  Parker  had  seen  to  that  (an 
incident  which  was  to  tell  against  him  in  a  D.O.R.A. 
prosecution  months  after).  A  small  body  of  the  comrades 
closed  round  Hardie.  There  was  a  rush  near  the  door 
but  the  street  was  reached  safely.  The  crowd  surged 
down  the  side  street,  but  in  the  main  street  it  began  to 
get  less.  But  several  hundred  men  followed  us  up  the 
main  street  singing  their  jingo  songs.  Hardie  was 
unperturbed ;  he  walked  straight  on  with  his  head  erect, 
not  deigning  to  look  either  to  the  right  or  the  left. 
He  was  staying  with  Matt  Lewis,  the  school  teacher, 
secretary  of  the  local  Labour  Party.  As  we  turned  up 
the  road  the  crowd  became  gradually  less  and,  as  the 
house  was  reached  the  sight  of  Mrs.  Lewis  with  the  baby 
in  her  arms  dared  the  rest.  Several  of  the  comrades 
kept  watch  for  some  time.  Hardie  sat  down  in  the  arm- 
chair by  the  fire  and  lit  his  pipe.  He  was  silent  for  a 
time  staring  into  the  fire.  Then  he  joined  in  the 
conversation,  but  did  not  talk  so  much  as  usual.  I  had 
to  catch  the  nine  o'clock  train  down  the  valley.  He 
shook  hands,  and  said,  'I  understand  what  Christ  suffered 
in  Gethsemane  as  well  as  any  man  living.' ' 

347 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

A  report  of  the  meeting  in  the  "Western  Mail,"  which 
had  for  its  headings 

"Mr.  Hardie  Hooted. 
"Hostile  Reception  in  his  own  Constituency. 


"Wild  Scenes  at.Aberdare  Meeting." 

confirmed  the  foregoing  account  in  every  particular,  but, 
in  addition,  credited  him  with  having  restrained  his 
supporters  from  retaliating,  thereby  preventing  outbursts 
of  actual  violence.  From  this  report  we  learn  also  that 
"amid  a  hurricance  of  booing  Mr.  Hardie  said  that  the 
whole  Liberal  press  stood  for  British  neutrality  until 
they  heard  Sir  Edward  Grey's  speech  last  Monday. 
The  effect  of  that  speech  was  that  the  Liberal  Party 
found  itself  committed  to  war  without  having  been 
consulted  in  any  shape  or  form'5;  and  that  in  his  con- 
cluding words  he  declared  that  "he  had  won  this  seat 
as  a  pro-Boer,  and  he  was  going  to  oppose  this  war  in 
the  interests  of  civilisation  and  the  class  to  which  he 
belonged."  The  other  meetings  were  abandoned  and 
he  returned  to  London,  where,  broken  in  spirit  for  the 
time,  he  unbosomed  himself  to  a  friend.  The  result  was 
that  another  meeting  in  Merthyr  was  arranged  and 
MacDonald,  Glasier  and  Hardie  had  a  triumphant 
reception. 

Nor  is  it  too  much  to  believe  that  if  he  had  lived  till 
an  election  came  round,  he  would  have  still  held  the  seat 
for  Labour.  He  spoke  several  times  in  the  constituency 
during  the  ensuing  twelve  months  without  molestation, 
and  continued  his  weekly  criticism  of  the  Government 
in  the  "Merthyr  Pioneer."  There  was  evidence  that  his 
strong  personality  was  beginning  to  prevail  again  over 
the  temporary  war  prejudice.  He  had,  however,  received 

348 


THE    WORLD    CONFLICT 

a  mortal  blow,  and  that  Aberdare  meeting  gave  the  fatal 
wound  to  the  man  who  had  lived  his  life  for  his  fellows.  ! 
He  derived  great  comfort  from  the  knowledge  that  his 
Welsh  I .  L .  P .  comrades  were  staunch .  Except '  'one  who 
was  numbered  with  us,"  there  were  no  deserters.  Di 
Davies,  Lewellyn  Francis,  John  Barr,  Evan  Parker, 
Matt  Lewis,  Stonelake,  Morris,  the  Hughes  family,  all 
the  stalwarts  who  had  fought  and  won  with  him,  were 
now  ready  to  fight  and  lose  with  him,  and  to  stand  by 
him,  even  unto  death  if  need  be.  He  had  reason  once 
again  to  be  proud  of  his  I.L.P.  He  did  not  hide  from 
them  nor  from  himself  the  seriousness  of  the  outlook. 
"This  war,"  he  told  the  Merthyr  comrades,  "means 
conscription,"  and  there  were  tears  in  his  eyes  as  he  said 
it.  "My  own  boy  may  be  taken,  and  I  would  rather  see 
him  in  his  grave  than  compelled  to  fight  against  other 
workers." 

He  went  home  to  Cumnock  to  see  the  boy,  and  the 
boy's  mother  and  sister,  and  to  rest  himself  for  a  little 
while.  It  was  more  than  time. 

Similar  experiences  to  those  of  Hardie  befell 
the  other  I.L.P.  Members  of  Parliament.  MacDonald 
at  Leicester,  Jowett  at  Bradford,  Richardson  at 
Whitehaven,  Snowden — when  he  reached  home — at 
Blackburn,  had  all  to  pass  through  the  same  ordeal  of 
calumny  and  abuse,  growing  ever  more  bitter  and 
unscrupulous  as  the  years  of  war  lengthened  out,  and 
constitutional  methods  of  government  were  displaced  by 
militarism  and  bureaucracy.  Hardie  did  not  live  to  see 
the  evil  thing  at  its  very  worst.  For  the  others  there 
is  at  least  this  consolation  :  they  have  lived  to  see  their 
principles  vindicated,  and  may  yet  live  to  see  their 
cause  triumphant  and  their  position  honoured. 


349 


CHAPTER  FOURTEEN 

THE  LAST  YEAR 

HARDIE'S  rest-time  at  Cumnock  did  not  last 
long.  He  was  not  in  good  health,  and  never 
was  again;  but  while  any  capacity  for  work, 
mental  or  physical,  remained,  he  could  not  lie  idle,  a 
mere  onlooker  at  the  new  phases  of  the  conflict  in  which 
he  had  spent  his  life,  the  conflict  between  war  and  peace, 
between  Capitalism  and  Socialism.  The  forces  of  evil 
had  triumphed  and  were  in  the  ascendant.  That  was 
all  the  more  reason  for  continuing  to  fight  against  them. 
He  had  fought  with  his  back  to  the  wall  before.  He 
would  do  so  now,  though  it  should  prove  to  be  the  last 
fight  of  all. 

On  August  27th,  he  had  an  article  in  the  "Labour 
Leader"  which  showed  no  falling  off  in  vigour  of 
expression  or  lucidity  of  statement.  It  was  in  answer 
p  the  specious  plea  put  forward  on  behalf  of  those 
I  Socialists  who  had  become  aggressively  pro-British  and 
'  needed  some  plausible  justification  for  their  lapse  from 
the  principles  of  Internationalism.  Their  plea  was  that 
this  -country  was  not  at  war  with  the  German  people 
but  with  the  Kaiser,  and  that  the  overthrow  of  Kaiserdom 
would  be  in  the  interests  of  Socialism  in  Germany.;  The 
victory  of  the  Allies,  in  fact,  would  be  a  victory  for 
Socialism.  Logically,  though  the  apologists  shrank 
from  committing  themselves  to  the  statement  in  so  many 
words,  the  war,  from  the  British  point  of  view,  was  a 
Socialist  one.  Hardie  reminded  the  people  who  argued 

350 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

in  this  fashion  that  one  of  the  Allies  was  the  government 
of  the  Czar,  and  he  wanted  to  know  how  Socialism  would 
gain  by  the  substitution  of  Czardom  for  Kaiserdom.  If 
he  had  lived,  he  might  have  been  able  to  show  that  it 
was  only  when  Czardom  ceased  to  be  of  any  value  as  an 
ally  that  Socialism  was  able  to  make  headway  in  Russia. 
As  it  was,  he  was  able  to  show  that  it  was  this  very  fear 
of  the  supremacy  of  Czardom  that  had  made  some 
German  Socialists  also  forget  their  Internationalism. 
One  passage  from  this  article  should  be  quoted  as  it 
gives  the  point  of  view  which  largely  determined 
Hardie's  attitude  towards  the  war  both  before  its  out- 
break and  during  its  process  in  the  remaining  months 
in  which  he  was  to  be  a  spectator.  "Let  anybody  take  a 
map  of  Europe  and  look  at  the  position  of  Germany  :  on 
the  one  side  Russia  with  her  millions  of  trained  soldiers 
and  unlimited  population  to  draw  upon  (its  traditional 
policy  for  over  a  hundred  years  has  been  to  reduce 
Prussia  to  impotence,  so  that  the  Slav  may  reign 
supreme),  and  on  the  other  side  France,  smarting  under 
her  defeat  and  the  loss  of  her  two  provinces,  Alsace  and 
Lorraine,  in  1870.  For  a  number  of  years  past  these 
two  militarisms  have  had  a  close  and  cordial  alliance. 
What  was  it  that  brought  the  Czardom  of  Russia  into 
alliance  with  the  free  Republic  of  France?  One  object, 
and  one  alone,  to  crush  Germany  between  them.  German 
armaments  and  the  German  navy,  were  primarily 
intended  to  protect  herself  and  her  interests  against 
these  two  open  enemies.  If  this  reasoning  be  correct, 
it  follows  that  our  being*  in  the  war  is  a  matter  of  the  free 
choice  of  our  rulers  who  appear  to  prefer  that  Russia 
should  become  the  domineering  power  of  Europe.  I 
do  not  write  these  words  in  order  to  say  that  we  should 
now  withdraw  from  the  conflict.  That  is  clearly  an 
impossibility  at  present.  But  if  we  can  get  these  facts 

351 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

instilled  into  the  mind  and  brain  of  our  own  people,  and 
of  the  working  class  generally,  we  shall  be  able  to  exert 
a  much  greater  influence  in  bringing  the  war  to  a  close 
much  more  speedily  than  the  military  element  contem- 
plates at  present." 

In  this  same  article  he  pointed  out  that  Lord 
Kitchener's  new  army  scheme  involved  the  raising  and 
training  of  not  merely  one  hundred  thousand  men,  but 
of  five  hundred  thousand,  and  that  the  final  outcome 
thereof  would  be,  and  was  intended  to  be,  Conscription, 
a  prediction  which  the  Socialist  patriots  pooh-poohed  as 
being  the  one  thing  from  which  their  voluntary  recruiting 
campaign  was  going  to  save  the  country!  Hardie's 
prediction,  much  to  his  own  sorrow,  was  just  on  the  verge 
of  fulfilment  when  death  took  him  away  from  it  all.  He 
was  at  least  spared  from  seeing  this  humiliation  and 
enslavement  of  his  class,  for  whose  independence  he 
had  fought  all  the  days  of  his  life. 

The    article    concluded :  ^Some    British    Socialists 

are  unfortunately  ranging  themselves  on  the  side  of 

I    militarism,  and  we   shall  require  to  take   the  strongest 

/     possible  action  to  make  it  clear  to  our  comrades  on  the 

Continent  that  the  hands  of  the  I.L.P.,  at  least,  are 

clear,    and   that   when   the   conflict   is   over,    and   we 

have  once  again  to  meet  our  German,  French,  Belgian 

and  Russian  comrades,  no  part  of  the  responsibility  for 

the  crime  that  has  been  done  in  Europe  can  be  laid 

at  our  door.'^ 

By  this  time  it  had  become  evident  that  the  I.L.P. 
would  be  the  only  political  party  or  section  in  this 
country  refusing  to  accept  any  share  of  responsibility 
for  the  prosecution  of  the  war.  The  Government  started 
a  great  recruiting  campaign  and  called  upon  all  political 
and  Labour  organisations  to  assist.  A  majority  of  the 
Labour  Party  Executive  accepted  the  invitation,  as  did 

352 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

also  the  Parliamentary  Labour  Party,  and  both  placed 
their  organising  machinery  at  the  service  of  the  War 
Office. 

[The  I.L.P.  representatives  on  the  Labour  Party 
Executive  opposed  this  decision  and  reported  to  their^, 
own  Head  Office,  while  MacDonald  had  resigned  from 
the  position  of  Chairman  of  the  Labour  Party,  actions 
which  were  endorsed  by  the  National  Council  and  by 
the  entire  I.L.P.  movement f^/The  reasons  for  this  line 
of  conduct  must  have  been  "evident  to  all  who  had  any 
knowledge  of  the  origin  and  history  of  the  Independent 
Labour  Party.  To  have  joined  with  the  other  parties 
would  have  been  equivalent  to  ceasing  to  be  an  Inde- 
pendent Labour  Party,  and  neither  the  leaders  nor 
the  rank  and  file  were  prepared  to  commit  moral  suicide 
in  support  of  a  war  which  they  had  for  ten  years  back 
strenuously  striven  to  obviate.  The  National  Labour 
Party  might,  if  it  choose,  merge  itself  with  its  bitterest 
opponents,  but  the  I.L.P.  could  not  do  that.  Even  if 
Hardie  and  MacDonald  had  favoured  such  a  policy- -an 
unimaginable  supposition — they  could  not  have  carried 
the  Party  with  them.  Most  of  the  Divisional  and 
Federation  and  Branch  officials  would  have  resigned, 
and  there  would  have  been  an  end  of  the  I.L.P.,  a 
consummation  which  would  doubtless  have  gladdened 
the  hearts  of  the  orthodox  party  politicians. 

The  National  Council,  in  its  recommendations  to 
Branches,  declared  :  "If  advice  has  to  be  given  to  the 
workers,  we  hold  it  should  come  from  our  own  platforms, 
preserving  the  character  and  traditions  of  our  move- 
ment, and  we  refuse  to  take  our  stand  by  militarists  and 
enemies  of  Labour  with  whose  outlook  and  aims  we  are 
in  sharpest  conflict,  and  who  will  assuredly  seize  this 
opportunity  to  justify  the  policy  leading  up  to  the  war. 
Now  that  the  country  has  been  drawn  into  a  deadly  and 

353 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

desperate  war,  which  may  involve,  in  the  end,  our 
existence  as  a  nation,  it  is  not  a  matter  for  speech  making, 
least  of  all  from  those  who  will  not  themselves  be  called 
upon  to  face  the  horrors  of  the  trenches." 

We  can  well  understand  that  the  spectacle  of  the 
Labour  Party  (in  the  creation  and  fostering  of  which  he 
had  given  so  much  of  his  life)  transforming  itself  into 
a  War  Office  annexe  was  a  mortifying  and  painful 
spectacle  to  Hardie.  Even  more  poignant  were  the 
emotions  evoked  by  the  consequent  estrangement 
between  men  who  had  been  his  intimate  friends  and 
comrades,  some  of  whom  owed  whatever  endowment 
of  political  prestige  and  opportunity  they  possessed  to 
their  association  with  himself.  I  A  violent  onslaught  in 
J  the  press  by  H.  G.  Wells  affected  him  not  at  all,  but 
parting  company  with  George  Barnes  and  some  others 
hurt  him  deeply  and  permanently.  He  was  stricken  not 
only  by  the  world,  but  from  within  his  own  household. 
The  steadfastness  of  the  I.L.P.  was  the  one  sustaining 
fact  proving  that  all  was  not  lost,  and  giving  to  life  still 
some  zest  and  comfort.  But  even  here  there  were 
individual  defections  that  cut  him  to  the  heart.  In  the 
same  week  in  which  the  already  quoted  article  appeared, 
he,  with  James  Maxton,  Chairman  of  the  Scottish  I.L.P. 
Council,  and  the  present  writer,  attended  a  district 
conference  at  Edinburgh  to  explain  and  discuss  the 
Party's  policy.  From  Glasgow  he  telegraphed  to  a 
trusted  Edinburgh  friend  to  meet  him  at  the  station. 
This  friend  was  one  of  those  who  had  kept  an  open  door 
for  Hardie,  who  had  pressed  always  to  be  nearest  to 
him  on  public  occasions  :  a  most  devoted  follower.  At 
the  station  the  friend  was  not.  Instead,  there  was  a 
messenger  to  say  that  he  had  another  engagement. 
Hardie  understood.  Another  personal  tie  was  broken 
never  to  be  renewed.  There  were  others.  It  was  all 

354 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

part  of  the  price.     There  were  more  war-wounds  than 
those  of  the  battlefield,  and  just  as  deadly. 

This  conference  at  Edinburgh,  and  one  the  following 
day  at  Glasgow,  endorsed  fully  the  policy  outlined  by 
the  National  Council,  which  was  indeed  simply  a 
reflection  of  the  will  of  the  Party  in  general.  At  both 
conferences  Hardie  spoke  with  vigour  and  clearness  and 
seemed  to  be  the  same  man  he  had  always  been,  save 
for  a  slight  tendency  to  irritability,  most  unusual  with 
him,  and  probably  indicating  some  nervous  derangement 
due  to  his  recent  trying  experiences. 
|  That  his  mental  powers  were  unimpaired  was  shown 
in"5  strong  and  uncompromising  reply  to  the  critics  of 
the  I.L.P.  in  the  "Labour  Leader"  of  September  loth. 
Amongst  these  critics  were  included  Mr.  H.  G.  Wells, 
of  whom  and  his  friends  in  the  controversy  Hardie  said 
they  "must  make  up  their  own  minds  as  to  what  they 
must  do.  That  is  their  own  affair.  But  one  thing  they 
must  not  do.  They  must  not  lie  about  those  who  differ 
from  them.  When  Mr.  Wells  writes  that  I  am  'trying 
to  misrepresent  the  negotiations  which  took  place  before 
the  war/  he  writes  an  untruth.  Mr.  Wells  is  shouting 
with  the  multitude  and  it  is  unworthy  of  the  man  to 
speak  of  either  Mr.  Ramsay  MacDonald  or  myself  as 
having  whined  in  our  criticism  of  the  policy  of  the 
Foreign  Secretary.  But,  after  all,  Mr.  Wells  has  a 
reputation,  not  only  in  newspaper  articles,  but  in  his 
books,  of  taking  a  mean  advantage  of  those  whom  he 
does  not  like."jThe  manner  of  Mr.  Wells'  retort  proved 
that  Hardie  Kad  not  lost  his  old  faculty  for  making  his 
opponents  very  angry  while  he  himself  remained  per- 
fectly cool.  In  this  article,  on  the  question  of  recruiting, 
he  had  a  query  for  Trade  Union  leaders.  "It  was  in  the 
year  1911  that  the  British  army  was  last  mobilised — and 
two  men  were  shot  dead  at  Llanelly.  Would  any  railway 

355 


J.    KEIR   BARDIE 

man  have  touted  for  recruits  for  the  army  then?  And 
is  not  the  enemy  of  the  worker  the  same  now  as  then? 
The  most  prominent  of  the  South  African  exiles  has 
been  to  Germany  and  comes  back  with  the  declaration 
that  'the  only  attitude  for  the  British  Empire  to  adopt, 
I  am  convinced,  is  to  fight  with  every  available  man  until 
the  Prussian  military  despotism  is  beaten.  I  am  pleased 
to  learn  that  South  Africa  is  rising  to  the  occasion/  Now, 
is  was  not  'Prussian  military  despotism'  that  sent  troops 
to  massacre  striking-  miners  in  Johannesburg,  or  that  sent 
into  exile,  where  they  still  are,  the  writer  of  that  passage 
and  his  colleagues." 

What  was  wrong  with  Hardie  and  the  I.L.P.  was  that 
their  memories  were  too  retentive.  They  could  not 
forget  that  there  was  a  capitalist  system  and  a  capitalist 
class,  or  that  there  was  a  British  policy  which  openly 
labelled  itself  "Imperialism/'  nor  could  they  forget 
history  and  its  story  of  how  all  wars  began — and  how 
they  ended. 

During  the  month  of  September,  similar  conferences 
to  those  at  Edinburgh  and  Glasgow  were  held  all  over 
the  country,  those  at  Ipswich,  Leeds,  Liverpool, 
Manchester  and  Eccles  being  addressed  by  Hardie 
who  continued  to  show  the  same  energy  which  had 
characterised  his  propaganda  work  all  through  life,  so 
that  there  seemed  some  justification  for  the  belief 
amongst  those  who  were  not  in  close  touch  with  him  that 
his  leadership  would  be  available  for  many  years  to  come, 
and  that  the  end  of  the  war,  which  it  was  hoped  would 
come  soon  by  means  of  negotiation,  would  find  him  still 
in  the  van  of  the  progressive  movement. 

In  October,  he  was  back  in  his  own  constituency  where 
the  reception  given  him  (the  meeting  to  which  reference 
has  already  been  made)  was  in  striking  contrast  to  the 
organised  hooliganism  at  Aberdare  in  the  first  week  of 

356 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

the  war.  With  him  were  MacDonald  and  Glasier,  and 
to  an  audience  of  three  thousand  in  the  skating  rink  at 
Merthyr  the  trio  of  the  I. L. P.  champions  explained  and 
defended  the  policy  of  the  Party.  They  were  well 
received  and  loudly  cheered,  and  the  indications  were 
that  Hardie  had  not  lost  his  hold  on  the  constituency,  and 
that  any  defection  there  may  have  been  was  more  than 
counterbalanced  by  new  adherents  won  by  his  courage 
and  straightforwardness.  He  also  held  meetings  of  the 
I.L.P.  branches  in  the  constituency,  at  Merthyr,  Moun- 
tain Ash,  Aberdare  and  Penrhiwceiber,  receiving  votes 
of  confidence  in  each  place.  This  was  at  a  time  when 
the  war  fever  was  mounting  and  the  recruiting  campaign 
was  in  full  swing.  He  was  still  continuing  his  weekly 
articles  in  the  "Merthyr  Pioneer/5  which  circulated  all 
through  the  constituency,  and  the  people  in  the  district 
were  thoroughly  familiar  with  his  views  and  opinions  on 
the  war,  his  attitude  towards  recruiting  and  his  general 
outlook.  The  fact  that  there  were  no  manifestations  of 
hostility  during  this  visit  might  have  been  an  indication 
of  the  existence  of  a  spirit  of  fair  play  in  the  Merthyr 
community  sadly  lacking  in  most  other  districts,  or  it 
might  have  been  due  to  the  personal  respect  which  his 
past  services  had  won  from  them.  Probably  both 
influences  were  at  work. 

In  the  "Labour  Leader"  of  November  5th,  Hardie 
had  a  review  of  Brailsford's  book,  "The  War  of  Steel 
and  Gold,"  written  before  the  outbreak  of  war,  but  as 
readers  of  the  book  know,  substantiating  both  by  fact 
and  argument  the  Socialist  analysis  of  the  causes  which 
produced  the  war.  As  was  to  be  expected,  Hardie  gave 
the  book  high  praise.  The  opponents  of  the  war, 
standing  against  overwhelming  odds,  with  the  entire 
British  press  against  them  and  a  Defence  of  the  Realm 
Act  already  looking  for  sedition  in  every  pacifist 

Y  357 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

utterance,  were  naturally  glad  to  avail  themselves  of 
every  intellectual  contribution  which  might  fortify  them 
in  the  defence  of  their  convictions.  At  the  outset  of 
the  war  the  withdrawal  from  the  Government  of  such 
men  as  Lord  Morley,  Lord  Loreburn,  Mr.  John  Burns, 
and  Mr.  C.  P.  Trevelyan  was  of  itself  a  comforting 
though  silent  witnessing  on  their  behalf,  while  the 
searching  criticism  of  foreign  policy  by  Bertrand 
Russell,  Gilbert  Cannan,  E.  D.  Morel,  and  Arthur 
Ponsonby,  M.P.,  none  of  whom  could  at  that  time  be 
described  as  Socialists  in  their  outlook,  was  also  of 
great  value.  In  the  same  category  was  Mr.  Brailsford's 
book,  and  it  was  eminently  satisfactory  to  Hardie  because 
it  emphasised  the  sinister  influence  of  Russia,  upon 
which  he  had  insisted  so  strongly  in  all  his  platform  and 
press  declarations.  He  urged  that  it  should  be  widely 
circulated  by  all  I.L.P.  branches  and  propaganda 
agencies. 

George  Bernard  Shaw's  pamphlet,  " Common  Sense 
about  the  War,"  which  first  appeared  as  an  article  in 
"The  New  Statesman,"  and  was  the  cause  of  much 
controversy  and  the  subject  of  hostile  criticism  in  "The 
Citizen,"  a  paper  originally  promoted  as  the  organ  of 
the  Labour  movement,  gave  Hardie  much  satisfaction, 
chiefly  because  it  tore  to  shreds  that  British  self- 
righteousness  which  saw  motes  in  the  diplomatic  German 
eye,  but  never  a  beam  in  that  of  the  British  or  the  Allies. 
He  wrote  the  following  letter  to  Shaw  :— 

"House  of  Commons, 

"November  26th,  1914. 

"Dear  Bernard  Shaw, 

"As  my  disgust  with  the  'Citizen's5  attitude  over  the 
war  is  great,  I  have  not  even  looked  at  it  for  some  weeks. 
Thus  it  comes  that  I  knew  nothing  about  its  attack  on 

358 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

your  'New  Statesman'  article  until  someone  told  me  of 
your  letter  in  to-day's  issue.  I  am  sending  for  the  issue 
containing  the  attack  and  shall  see  what  can  be  done 
to  raise  the  Socialist  and  Labour  unions  to  make  protest. 
The  paper  is  making  rapidly  for  the  void.  The  circu- 
lation, after  going  up  to  70,000  [a  great  under-estimate] 
a  day,  is  now  less  than  it  was  before  the  war  broke  out.  A 
big  effort  is  now  about  to  be  made  to  raise  more  funds 
to  keep  it  going,  but  nothing  can  save  it  so  long  as  the 
present  bumptious  and  reactionary  cad  is  in  the  chair. 

"May  I  now  say  that  which  I  failed  to  muster  enough 
courage  to  say  when  first  I  felt  the  thrill  of  your  article, 
that  its  inspiration  is  worth  more  to  England  than  this 
war  has  yet  cost  her — in  money  I  mean.  When  it  gets 
circulated  in  popular  form  and  is  read,  as  it  will  be,  by 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  our  best  people  of  all  classes, 
it  will  produce  an  elevation  of  tone  in  the  national  life 
which  will  be  felt  for  generations  to  come.  In  Scottish 
ploughman  phrase,  'God  bless  ye,  and  send  ye  speed.' 

"I  prohibit  any  reply  to  this,  or  even  acknowledge- 
ment. It  is  the  expression  of  a  heart  which  now  throbs 
towards  you  with  almost  feelings  of  devotion. 

"Sincerely, 

"J.    KEIR   HARDIE. 

"P.S.—  Only  a  Celt  could  have  done  it." 

Shaw's  article  did  not  produce  "an  elevation  of  tone 
in  the  national  life."  All  the  angelic  hosts  could  not 
have  done  that.  It  only  added  to  the  volume  of 
damning.  The  tone-producers  were  Northcliffe,  Hulton, 
Bottomley,  and  such-like,  and  their  combined  output 
was  the  reverse  of  elevating. 

The  fervour  of  gratitude  in  the  closing  words  of 
Hardie's  letter  gives  some  indication  of  how  much  he 
was  feeling  the  need  for  sympathy  and  support.  With 

359 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

all  his  courageous  facing  of  the  situation  on  the  plat- 
form and  in  the  press,  so  far  as  it  was  available,  the 
conditions  growing  up  around  him  were  such  as  to  make 
life  for  a  man  of  his  temperament  and  principles,  almost 
unbearable.  He  could  hardly  move  without  coming 
in  contact  with  the  things  that  were  hateful  to  him. 
The  very  colour  scheme  of  the  streets  had  now  militarist 
khaki  for  its  dominant  note.  The  noises  in  the  streets 
were  militarist  noises,  even  the  cries  of  the  newsboys 
were  "shouts  of  war/'  The  marching  and  drilling  of 
men,  the  drum-beatings  and  bugle-calls,  the  open  train- 
ing of  young  boys  in  bomb-throwing  and  in  bayonet 
exercise  with  dummy  figures  to  represent  Germans,  and 
with  accompanying  obscene  expletives  to  stimulate 
hate  and  blood-lust,  were  rehearsals  of  the  foul  sport 
deliberately  calculated  to  brutalise  the  public  mind. 
The  overbearing  vulgar  swagger  of  many  of  the  officer 
class,  the  steady  supersession  of  civic  authority  by 
military  rule,  the  abdication  of  Parliament  itself  in  favour 
of  the  militarists,  and,  added  to  all,  the  news  and  ever 
more  news,  of  colossal  bloody  murder  on  the  battlefield, 
made  the  world  into  an  inferno  for  him.  He  could  not 
get  away  from  it.  Wherever  he  turned  it  was  there.  In 
the  House  of  Commons,  in  the  House  of  God;  in  the 
streets,  in  the  railway  stations  and  the  train  compart- 
ments ;  amongst  the  hills  and  glens  and  valleys,  on  the 
open  highway — everywhere  omniscient  and  omni- 
present, ruthless  in  the  lusty  day  of  its  power.  The  thing 
he  had  fought,  Militarism,  was  triumphant.  Perhaps 
worst  of  all,  he  saw  in  this  the  coarsening  of  the  public 
mind,  the  swamping  of  its  intelligence,  and,  in  spite  of 
fine  words,  the  lowering  of  its  ideals.  If  these  things 
read  hard,  they  must  stand  here  as  they  were  Hardie's 
thoughts,  and  time  has  already  begun  to  deliver  its 
verdict  upon  them. 

360 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

In  the  midst  of  all  this,  Shaw's  "Common  Sense 
about  the  War,"  even  with  its  acceptance  of  the  war  as 
a  fact  which  could  not  now  be  run  away  from,  was  to 
Hardie  like  a  gleam  of  sunshine  through  the  darkness- 
like  a  drop  of  water  to  a  very  thirsty  man. 

In  the  last  week  of  November,  he  went  to  Blackburn, 
Philip  Snowden's  constituency,  and  spoke  three  times 
in  the  district.  Snowden  was  at  the  time  in  New  Zealand, 
but  he  had  found  means,  by  speech  and  interview,  to 
let  his  constituents  and  the  world  in  general  know  that 
he  was  at  one  with  his  I.L.P.  colleagues  at  home  in  their 
policy  on  the  war.  It  was  necessary,  in  his  absence,  to 
have  that  policy  made  clear,  and  to  give  the  fullest 
encouragement  to  his  supporters.  Hardie  evidently 
succeeded  in  doing  so,  for  the  "Northern  Daily 
Telegraph"  declared  that,  "both  at  the  Trades  Hall  and 
the  I.L.P.  Institute,  Mr.  Hardie  was  greeted  in  a  most 
cordial  manner,  his  reception  possibly  being  warmer 
because  of  the  way  he  has  been  attacked  during  recent 
weeks." 

He  had,  however,  for  the  time  being  at  least, 
exceeded  the.  limit  of  his  powers  and  had  once  more  to 
turn  his  face  homeward  suffering  from  what  appeared  to 
his  friends  to  be  a  very  dangerous  nervous  breakdown. 
During  the  greater  part  of  December  he  rested  at  home, 
but  did  not  show  much  sign  of  improvement.  It  was 
this  illness  which  gave  rise  to  a  rumour  that  he  had  been 
attacked  by  paralysis,  a  rumour  which  travelled  far,  as 
we  shall  see.  The  trouble  was  quite  serious  enough, 
and  it  would  have  been  good  for  him  if  he  could  have 

>been  prevailed  upon  to  continue  resting.  It  was  perhaps 
part  of  the  trouble  that  he  could  not  do  so.  He  was 
restless  and  unsettled,  and  could  not  stay  quietly  as  a 
looker-on  at  events.  He  had  to  be  faithful  in  his  storm- 
tossed  world. 

361 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

On  the  first  Saturday  of  the  New  Year,  he  was  in 
Glasgow  addressing  the  annual  Scottish  Divisional  Con- 
ference of  the  I.L.P.  Here  an  incident  occurred  of  a 
kind  not  calculated  to  be  helpful  to  a  man  suffering 
from  nervous  trouble.  It  was  a  conference  of  delegates 
to  which  the  public  had  no  right  of  admission,  but  it  was 
found  that  four  persons  had  obtained  entrance  to  the 
ante-room  of  the  hall  without  the  necessary  credentials 
and  were  known  to  be  detectives.  They  were  asked 
to  withdraw,  and  did  so.  The  Defence  of  the  Realm 
Act  was  now  in  full  operation,  but  the  officers  of  the 
law  had  not  yet  fully  realised  the  powers  which  it  con- 
ferred upon  them.  Otherwise  they  might  have  insisted 
upon  remaining,  in  which  case  there  would  probably 
have  been  serious  trouble  arising  not  out  of  any  words 
spoken  by  Hardie,  but  out  of  the  resentment  of  the 
delegates  to  the  presence  of  spies.  Hardie  was  not 
informed  of  the  incident  till  after  he  had  spoken,  but 
it  annoyed  him  and  rankled  in  his  mind.  He  was 
accustomed  to  open  opposition  and  to  press  misrepre- 
sentation. But  to  be  spied  upon  in  his  own  country 
was  a  new  experience,  and  too  much  akin  to  Russian 
and  German  methods.  It  troubled  him  greatly  and 
preyed  upon  him. 

His  speech  was  simply  in  the  nature  of  advice  to  the 
delegates  to  hold  fast  to  the  I.L.P.  organisation  during 
the  troublous  times  through  which  they  were  passing. 
He  counselled  them  to  continue  their  propaganda  for 
Socialism,  and  to  seek  representation  on  Citizen  Com- 
mittees and  all  other  bodies  through  which  it  might  be 
possible  to  safeguard  the  rights  and  interests  of  the 
common  people  without  taking  responsibility  for  the 
conduct  of  the  war.  He  also  advised  them  to  associate 
with  other  agencies  and  movements  working  for  the 
speedy  restoration  of  peace. 

362 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

On  the  following  night — Sunday — he  spoke  in  Hamil- 
ton, making  his  last  public  appearance  in  the  district 
where,  thirty-five  years  before,  he  had  started  out  as  an 
agitator.  There  were  men  there  who  had  worked  in  the 
pits  with  him,  and  who  still  worked  in  the  pits.  They 
were  proud  of  the  record  of  the  comrade  of  their  youth, 
but  some  of  them  perturbed  and  doubtful  of  the  wisdom 
of  his  attitude  on  the  war.  His  speech  was  a  vindication 
of  that  attitude  as  being  in  conformity  with  the  whole  of 
his  past  career.  He  showed  that  the  Liberal  Party  had 
held  the  same  attitude  as  himself  towards  the  war,  but 
had  changed  in  a  single  day.  His  own  principles,  as 
they  knew,  had  never  been  of  that  flexible  quality,  and 
he  held  that  because  the  Foreign  Office  secret  alliance 
with  Russia  had  involved  the  country  in  an  unnecessary 
war,  that  was  no  reason  why  he,  or  the  Party  to  which 
he  belonged,  should  approve  of  the  war,  but  rather  the 
reverse.  He  spoke  argumentatively  and  clearly,  but 
without  passion.  Mrs.  Hardie  was  with  him  on  the 
platform,  and  few  in  the  audience  could  have  guessed 
that  she  had  wished  to  keep  him  away  from  the  meeting 
and  that  her  one  concern  was  that  it  should  come  to  an 
end  quickly  that  she  might  get  him  away  safely  to  the 
place  where  he  ought  to  be,  in  bed,  and  within  call  of 
medical  attendance. 

After  a  week's  rest  he  began  to  regain  strength,  so 
much  so,  that  by  the  end  of  January  his  colleagues 
of  the  N.A.C.  sent  him  congratulations  on  his 
recovery.  The  re-assembling  of  Parliament  drew  him 
up  again  to  London  as  by  a  magnet,  to  live  again 
lonely  in  the  Nevill's  Court  lodgings  and  to  attend  to 
his  Parliamentary  work. 

On  February  25th,  he  spoke  in  opposition  to  the 
proposal  to  relax  the  educational  by-laws  to  enable 
children  under  twelve  to  be  employed  in  agricultural 

363 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

work,  the  alleged  reason  being  the  shortage  of  men 
caused  by  the  war.  He  contended  that  working-class 
children  should  not  have  their  educational  opportunities 
curtailed  because  of  the  war,  and  declared  that  the  real 
object  aimed  at  was  to  enable  the  farmers  to  obtain 
cheap  labour.  "The  by-laws,"  he  said,  "issued  to 
protect  our  children  are  being  practically  swept  out  of 
existence.  I  think  it  can  be  demonstrated  that  they  are 
bemg  swept  aside,  not  because  of  any  special  necessity 
for  child  labour,  but  very  largely  as  a  means  of  perpetu- 
ating uneducated  sweated  labour  in  the  agricultural 
districts."  He  had  a  partial  alternative,  in  the  suggest- 
ing of  which  there  came  out  some  personal  reminiscences 
of  an  interesting  kind.  "There  is  one  proposal  upon 
which  I  do  not  know  whether  my  colleagues  would  be 
unanimous,  but  which  I  think  might  be  used  to  great 
account  in  solving  this  problem  during  the  war  period. 
I  refer  to  the  employment  of  women.  I  can  remember 
in  Scotland,  my  own  mother,  who  was  a  farm  servant, 
often  at  work  after  she  was  married,  with  her  family 
growing  up.  I  have  seen  her  employed  in  the  fields  at 
kinds  of  work  which  I  would  not  like  to  see  women 
employed  at  now  :  but  there  is  much  work  about  a  farm 
which  is  perfectly  respectable  and  clean,  and  which  calls 
for  a  certain  amount  of  intelligence,  such  as  milking, 
the  handling  of  milk,  the  making  of  butter,  and  many 
other  occupations  which  a  woman  can  do  with  advantage 
to  herself  and  to  others.  But  the  average  woman  brought 
up  in  the  town  has  lost  all  instinct  for,  and  all  contact 
with,  the  life  of  the  farm." 

On  this  occasion,  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  he  claimed 
indulgence  from  his  fellow  Members  of  the  House  of 
Commons  on  the  ground  of  ill-health,  giving  that  as 
the  reason  for  lack  of  energy  in  his  treatment  of  the 
subject.  It  was  fitting  that  his  last  recorded  parlia- 

364 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

mentary  utterance  should  have  been  on  behalf  of 
working-class  children. 

About  this  time  it  would  be  that  he  met  by  chance 
Lord  Morley.  His  note  on  the  incident  in  the  "Merthyr 
Pioneer"  has  for  us  even  a  deeper  pathos  than  it  had 
then.  Not  Lord  Morley,  the  octogenarian,  was  the  first 
to  pass  from  the  scene,  but  Hardie  the  much  younger 
man.  "Passing  along  the  Lobby  the  other  day,  I  met  a 
familiar  figure,  the  outstanding  figure  of  the  trio  who 
resigned  from  the  Ministry  rather  than  soil  their 
consciences  by  the  bloodshedding  in  which  we  are  now 
engaged.  He  stopped  and  shook  hands  with  me. 
'You  have  been  ill/  he  said;  'what  was  the  matter?  Was 
it  the  war  which  so  weighed  upon  your  soul  and  spirit 
that  it  made  your  body  sick?'  I  had  to  smile  a  vague 
assent  to  the  question.  'The  war/  he  said,  'when  will  it 
end?  If  we  lose,  we  shall  pay  an  awful  penalty;  if  we 
win,  the  penalty  may  be  greater  still/  He  sighed  as  he 
walked  away  with  the  weight  of  eighty  years  bending  his 
shoulders.  I  stood  and  watched  the  retiring  figure,  and 
thought  to  myself,  there  goes  the  last  of  England's 
great  statemen.  To-day,  it  is  not  statesmanship  or 
principle  which  actuates  those  who  hold  office.  They 
are  as  completely  under  the  power  of  the  capitalist  as 
any  ordinary  member  of  the  Stock  Exchange." 

And  thus  these  two  sincere  men,  diametrically  opposed 
to  each  other  in  political  and  philosophical  outlook,  met 
now  on  common  moral  ground.  To  both,  the  war  was  a 
crime,  and  Britain's  part  in  it  wicked  and  foolish.  And 
both  were  helpless  to  prevent  it  or  to  stop  it. 

On  March  25th,  he  had  an  article  in  the  "Labour 
Leader,"  the  last  he  ever  wrote  for  that  paper,  though, 
as  we  shall  see,  not  his  last  press  utterance.  There  was 
nothing  valedictory  about  this  article,  nothing  to  indicate 
that  he  had  come  to  the  limit  of  his  power  or  that  he 

365 


J.    KEIR   BARDIE 

himself  felt  conscious  that  the  end  was  near.  The  title 
of  the  article  was  "Patriotism  Measured  in  Millions." 
Therein  he  traced  the  growth  of  the  Imperialist  idea  in 
British  foreign  policy,  synchronising  with  the  growth 
of  capital  investments  in  the  colonies  and  in  foreign 
countries,  and,  in  order  to  show  to  what  this  had  led,  he 
quoted  Lloyd  George's  reply  to  a  question,  on  March 
1 3th.  "The  total  British  capital  invested  abroad  amounts 
to  four  thousand  million  pounds  (£4,000,000,000),  and 
the  income  from  interest  on  colonial  and  foreign  invest- 
ments is  two  hundred  million  pounds  (£200,000,000)  a 
year." 

The  following  passage  from  this  article  is  well  worth 
producing  now.  "Very  many  millions  will  be  needed  to 
finance  our  allies,  and  to  induce  some  to  join  in  the 
murderous  melee  who  now  stand  aloof.  When  the  war 
is  over  these  will  require  large  sums  for  the  renewal  of 
their  navies,  and  the  creation  of  new,  and  the  repair  of 
war-destroyed,  railways  and  the  like.  There  will  also 
be  unlimited  scope  for  new  companies  to  open  out  the* 
great  mineral,  oil  and  other  industries  of  Russia,  Persia, 
and  the  Balkans,  which  are  yet  in  their  infancy,  and  the 
British  investor  will  be  the  only  man  left  with  money  to 
float  them.  France  and  Germany  will  alike  be  bankrupt, 
and  only  the  United  States  will  remain  as  a  -possible 
competitor  with  Lombard  Street" 

He  did  not  foresee  the  Bolshevik  intervention  to  spoil 
sport  for  the  British  financiers,  but,  had  he  lived,  he 
would  have  had  no  difficulty  in  explaining  the  malignant 
attempts  to  prevent  the  Socialist  regime  from  establishing 
itself  in  Russia. 

Withal  his  realistic  vision  of  the  dread  consequences 
of  the  war,  he  had  not  lost  hope  in  humanity,  nor  faith 
in  Socialism.  "When  the  war  is  only  a  stinking  memory 
of  a  bloodstained  nightmare,  and  we  are  again  face  to 

366 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

face  with  the  real  things  of  life,  then  surely  there  will  be 
a  great  and  mighty  agitation  for  complete  enfranchise- 
ment of  democracy,  man  and  woman  alike,  who  will  then 
be  able  to  win  control  over  both  domestic  and  foreign 
policy,  and  break  the  rule  of  those  to  whom  Imperialism 
and  Militarism  mean  wealth  and  power,  and  to  instal 
all  the  peoples  of  all  lands  in  authority,  and  thus  bring 
plenty,  peace  and  concord  to  a  long-suffering  race." 

This  was  his  last  "Labour  Leader"  article,  but  it 
might  have  been  written  in  his  prime,  so  vigorous  was 
it,  so  clear  in  the  marshalling  of  fact  and  argument,  so 
dignified  in  diction.  It  was  not  to  be  wondered  at  that 
the  movement  was  deceived  into  believing  that  the  end  of 
the  war  would  find  Keir  Hardie  still  guiding  and  inspir- 
ing it,  especially  as  during  all  this  time  he  had,  by  an 
extraordinary  exercise  of  will  power,  or  else  by  sheer 
force  of  habit,  been  contributing  almost  without  a  break 
his  weekly  article  to  the  "Merthyr  Pioneer,"  and  did 
so  up  till  as  late  as  April  i7th. 

Curiously  enough,  on  the  same  date  as  this  final 
"Labour  Leader"  article,  March  25th,  the  "Merthyr 
Pioneer,"  reproduced  from  an  American  paper,  the 
"Boston  Evening  Transcript,"  an  obituary  sketch  of 
Keir  Hardie's  career,  the  rumour  of  the  attack  of 
paralysis  having  evidently  been  accepted  as  true.  The 
sub-heading  of  the  sketch,  "Another  of  England's 
Picturesque  Figures  Passes  from  the  Scene,"  though 
premature,  was  not  inapt.  Keir  Hardie  had  not  passed, 
but  he  was  passing.  He  had  made  his  last  speech  in 
Parliament;  he  had  written  his  last  article  in  the  "Labour 
Leader";  and  now  he  was  going  to  attend  his  last  I.L.P. 
Conference. 

It  was  held  at  Norwich  under  conditions  unprecedented 
in  British  history.  Great  Britain  was  governed  as  if  it 
were  a  beleaguered  country.  There  had  been  night- 

367 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

time  Zeppelin  raids  on  the  Norfolk  coast,  and  when, 
on  Easter  eve,  the  I.L.P.  delegates,  many  of  whom 
had  been  travelling  for  twelve  hours  in  crowded  trains, 
reached  Norwich,  they  entered  a  city  of  dreadful  night, 
and  had  to  be  piloted  through  utter  darkness  to  their 
hotels  and  lodgings.  When  Easter  morn  came,  and 
with  it  the  blessed  sunshine,  it  revealed  a  city  full  of 
soldiers,  with  officers  billeted  in  all  the  hotels,  and  with 
bugle-calls  and  drum-beats  mocking  the  peaceful  message 
of  the  chiming  Eastertide  bells.  An  attempt  had  been 
made  to  prevent  the  I.L.P.  Conference  being  held, 
through  the  cancelling  of  the  halls  engaged  for  the  Con- 
ference and  the  public  meeting.  In  the  interests  of 
free  speech  the  Primitive  Methodist  Church  placed  its 
Schoolroom  at  the  disposal  of  the  Conference;  and  it 
has  to  be  recorded — and  remembered — that  two  other 
religious  organisations,  the  Scott  Memorial  Church  and 
the  Martineau  Unitarian  Church,  had  also  offered  the 
use  of  their  meeting  places. 

At  the  Conference,  Hardie,  who  was  looking  very 
ill,  spoke  only  once,  and  just  at  the  close,  in  support 
of  a  special  resolution  protesting  strongly  against 
severe  sentences  passed  upon  fifty-three  members  of 
the  Russian  Seamen's  Union  and  on  the  five  Socialist 
Members  of  the  Duma,  and  asking  the  British  Govern- 
ment to  bring  pressure  to  bear  on  the  Russian 
Government  with  a  view  to  their  ultimate  freedom.  In 
his  speech  he  declared  that  the  fifty-three  seamen  were 
in  prison  for  no  offence  except  membership  of  a  trade 
union.  Their  secretary  was  illegally  arrested  in  Egypt, 
he  was  sent  to  Russia,  and  there  sentenced  to  Siberia. 
"Some  of  us  tried  in  the  House  of  Commons  to  get  Sir 
Edward  Grey  to  intervene,  or  at  least  to  have  him 
tried  in  Egypt.  Grey  then  said  that  this  country  could 
not  interfere  with  the  political  affairs  of  another  country. 

368 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

One  of  the  biggest  risks  we  run  is  being  allied  to  a 
nation  whose  past  and  present  record  is  a  disgrace  to 
civilisation  and  progress.  The  alliance  with  Russia  is 
not  to  help  Belgium.  It  is  to  open  up  fresh  fields 
for  exploitation  by  capitalists.  We  register  our  protest 
against  all  the  infamies  of  the  bloody  cruelty  of  Russia." 

These  were  the  last  words  of  Keir  Hardie  at  a  Con- 
ference of  the  Independent  Labour  Party.  Never  again 
would  the  delegates  hear  the  voice  or  grasp  the  hand 
of  the  man  who  for  twenty-two  years  had  been  their 
leader,  comrade  and  friend. 

Yet  he  was  not  finished,  nor  his  fighting  quite  done. 
His  speech  at  the  public  meeting  on  the  Saturday 
evening  brought  him  once  again  into  public  conflict 
with  authority.  The  circumstances  are  within  memory, 
[[but  Hardie's  own  words  which  ruffled  Mr.  Lloyd  George 
to  anger,  will  best  recall  the  situation.  "In  time  of 
war,  one  would  have  thought  the  rich  classes  would 
grovel  on  their  knees  before  the  working  classes,  who 
are  doing  so  much  to  pile  up  their  wealth.  Instead, 
the  men  who  are  working  eighty-four  hours  a  week  are 
being  libelled,  maligned  and  insulted;  and,  on  the 
authority  of  their  employers,  the  lying  word,  accepted 
without  inquiry  by  Lloyd  George,  went  round  the  world 
that  the  working  class  were  a  set  of  drunken  hooligans. 
That  is  the  reward  they  got.  The  truth  is,  that  the 
shifts  could  be  arranged  so  as  to  overtake  all  the  work 
in  hand.  Mr.  John  Hill,  the  Secretary  of  the  Boiler- 
makers, has  shown  that  if  the  shipbuilders  would  reduce 
their  contracts  ten  per  cent.,  the  Government  could 
get  all  their  work  done,  but  the  shipbuilders  will  not  do 
that  because  ships  were  being  sold  at  two  and  threq 
times  their  value  before  the  war." 

^  Popularity  was  then,  as  always,  essential  to  Mr.  Lloyd 
George;  loss  of  it,   a  thing  to  be  dreaded.     At  that 

369 


J.    KEIR   BARDIE 

moment  especially  it  was  needful  for  him  to  stand  well 
in  the  opinion  of  the  working  classes.  He  hastened  to 
essay  the  task  of  clearing  himself  from  the  charge 
involved  in  Hardie's  remarks.  On  Monday  he  sent  a 
telegram  to  Hardie,  quoting  the  offending  passage,  and 
concluding  with  a  query  for  which  the  quotation  afforded 
no  basis  whatever.  "Would  you  kindly  let  me  know 
where  and  when  I  am  supposed  to  have  uttered  such 
words  or  anything  that  would  justify  so  monstrous  a 
deduction."  Hardie's  telegram  in  reply  was  as  follows  : 
"I  pointed  out  that  the  employers,  when  before  you, 
concerning  output  of  armaments,  etc.,  had  put  the  whole 
blame  on  the  drinking  habits  of  the  workers,  and  that 
you,  by  accepting  this  statement  without  challenge,  had 
given  world  currency  to  the  fiction  that  the  workers  were 
drunken  wasters.  I  never  said  'bullies'  nor  have  .1  seen 
the  report  from  which  you  quote. — Keir  Hardie." 
IjVIr.  Lloyd  George,  notwithstanding  this  explanation, 
sent  a  denunciatory  letter  to  the  press  accusing  the 
I.L.P.  leader  of  "reckless  assertion,"  "wild  accusation," 
"mischievous  statement,"  "excited  prejudice,"  but  at  the 
same  time  found  it  necessary  to  explain  that  he  himself 
had  referred  only  to  a  small  section  of  the  working 
classes,  a  qualifying  excuse  which  would  probably  never 
have  been  given  but  for  Hardie's  public  protest  on  behalf 
of  the  reputation  of  his  class.  Lloyd  George's  letter 
received  the  fullest  prominence  in  the  press.  Hardie's 
letter  in  reply  was  relegated  to  the  back  columns,  and 
in  some  cases  sub-edited  to  distortionTA 

With  this  incident  the  public  career  of  Keir  Hardie 
came  to  a  close.  He  ended,  as  he  had  begun,  standing  up 
for  the  working  people.  The  British  public  heard  no  more 
of  Keir  Hardie  until  the  closing  days  of  September,  when 
the  newspapers  announced  his  death.  During  the  inter- 
vening months  it  was  borne  in  upon  his  intimate  friends 

370 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

and    colleagues    that    the    days   of    their    leader   were 
numbered.    Indeed,  early  in  May  it  seemed  as  if  the  end 
had  come.    The  illness  from  which  he  had  been  suffering 
intermittently   since   the   previous   August  reached    an 
acute    stage,    producing    what    looked    like    complete 
collapse.     He  was  in  London  at  the  time,  and  after  a 
week,  at  the  end  of  which  it  had  become  evident  that  the 
necessary  care   and  attention  was  not   possible  in  the 
Nevill's  Court  lodgings,  and  that  in  his  physical  condi- 
tion travelling  home  to  Scotland  was  also  out  of  the 
question,  he  was  removed  to  Caterham Sanatorium, where 
he  had  alike  the  benefit  of  skilled  medical  and  nursing 
attendance,  and  the  devoted  service  of  personal  friends, 
chief  amongst  these  being  the  ever  faithful  Frank  Smith 
and  Tom  Richardson,  M.P.     Mr.  Smith  took  charge  of 
his  correspondence  and  warned  all  inquirers,  of  whom 
there  were  hundreds,  against  addressing  any  letters  to 
Hardie  himself,  such  letters  being  more  disturbing  than 
helpful.     At  the  end  of  the  first  month  he  was  still  unfit 
for  railway  travelling,  and  Mrs.  Hardie  came  up  from 
Cum  nock  and  remained  with  him  until  he  was  able  to 
face  the  homeward  journey  four  weeks  later.     During 
all    this   time    there   had  been   alternating   periods    of 
oblivion,  acute  physical  suffering,  and  apparently  normal 
alertness.    It  was  during  one  of  the  normal  intervals  that 
he,  with  the  consent  of  the  medical  advisers,  determined 
to   make    for    Cumnock.      He    broke    the    journey    at 
Newcastle  and  stayed  for  a  few  days  with  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Richardson,  arriving  home  in  Cumnock  at  the  end  of 
July,   Frank  Smith    and    Tom    Richardson   being   his 
travelling  companions.     A  week  or  two  of  rest  in  the 
home    circle   seemed   to   bring   him   some   renewal   of 
strength,  and  he  ventured  to  cross  over  to  Arran  where 
his  son  Duncan  was  having  a  brief  holiday — the  elder 
son,  James,  had  been  settled  in  America  for  some  years 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

and  was  therefore  unable  to  be  with  his  father  during 
these  last  weeks.  From  Arran,  after  a  few  days,  he  went 
on  a  visit  to  his  brother  George  at  Clarkston,  Glasgow, 
where  the  utmost  care  and  attention  awaited  him.  Neither 
the  breezes  of  Arran,  nor  the  comforts  of  home,  nor  the 
solicitude  of  friends  could  now  ward  off  the  approach 
of  that  "White  Herald"  of  whom  he  had  once  spoken 
as  a  welcome  friend  rather  than  a  foe  to  be  dreaded. 

On  Wednesday,  September  22nd,  a  change  for  the 
worse  took  place,  and  on  the  advice  of  the  doctors,  who 
still  seemed  to  think  that  some  partial  recovery  was 
possible,  removal  to  a  home  for  special  treatment  was 
decided  upon.  On  the  Saturday  a  great  weakness 
overcame  him,  and  in  the  evening  pneumonia  set  in. 
On  Sunday  at  noon,  September  26th,  he  passed  peace- 
fully away  in  the  presence  of  his  wife  and  daughter. 

Thus,  in  his  sixtieth  year,  in  the  second  month  of  the 
second  year  of  the  Great  War,  which  he  had  tried  to 
avert  and  of  which  he  was  unquestionably  one  of  the 
victims,  died  Keir  Hardie.  Next  morning,  when  the 
newspapers  announced  his  death,  they  carried  heartfelt 
sorrow  into  many  thousands  of  British  homes,  sorrow, 
not  alone  for  the  loss  of  a  great  agitator  and  Labour 
leader,  but  for  that  of  a  dear  personal  friend. 
Probably  never  was  any  public  man  so  sincerely  and 
deeply  loved  by  so  many  people  as  was  Keir  Hardie. 

On  the  following  Wednesday,  a  great  concourse  of 
mourners  of  all  classes,  but  mostly  of  the  working  class, 
joined  the  funeral  procession  which  followed  his  remains 
through  the  streets  of  Glasgow  to  the  Crematorium  at 
Maryhill,  where  eight  years  before  he  had  said  farewell 
to  his  father  and  mother.  Some  were  there  who  had 
accompanied  him  through  the  greater  part  of  his  public 
life,  Robert  Smillie,  Bruce  'Glasier,  Sandy  Haddow, 
George  Carson,  William  M.  Haddow,  Alex.  Gilchrist, 

372 


THE  LAST  YEAR 

James  Neil,  Cunninghame  Graham,  and  others,  recalling 
memories  of  the  early  days  of  struggle  ere  fame  or  even 
the  promise  of  success  had  come  as  a  stimulus  to  labour 
and  self-sacrifice.  His  colleagues  of  the  I.L.P.  National 
Council  were,  of  course,  there,  as  many  as  could  attend, 
Ramsay  MacDonald,  T.  D.  Benson,  W.  C.  Anderson, 
Fred  Jowett  and  the  others,  serious  and  sad  at  this  last 
parting  with  the  comrade  of  so  many  years  of  ceaseless 
endeavour  for  the  betterment  of  the  common  people. 
Delegates  came  all  the  way  from  Merthyr  Tydvil, 
members  of  the  election  committee  who  had  fought  side 
by  side  with  him  in  those  never-to-be-forgotten  political 
battles  and  who  now  realised  sorrowfully  that  never 
again  would  Keir  Hardie  lead  them  to  victory. 

At  the  funeral  there  were  no  delegates  from  foreign 
lands  to  lay  wreaths  upon  the  bier  of  the  man  who  had 
striven  so  resolutely  for  international  unity  of  purpose 
among  Socialists,  and  who  had  refused  to  join  in  a 
struggle  which  he  held  to  be  fratricidal  and  unnatural. 
The  war  which  had  slain  Jaures  of  France,  and  Franck 
of  Germany,  had  now  claimed  Keir  Hardie  of  Great 
Britain,  and  had  made  it  impossible  for  any  of  the  men 
and  women  with  whom  he  had  fraternised  in  the  common 
efforts  for  international  Socialist  achievement  to  manifest 
in  person  their  respect  for  him  and  his  work. 

A  simple  burial  service  was  conducted  by  the  Rev. 
A.  M.  Forson,  of  London,  whose  associations  with 
Hardie  dated  back  to  the  early  evangelising  days.  A  few 
words  from  Bruce  Glasier  calling  upon  those  present  to 
honour  the  memory  of  their  lost  leader  by  preserving 
his  ideals  and  continuing  his  work.  A  brief  exhortation 
in  a  similar  strain  to  the  multitude  outside  from  W.  C. 
Anderson — both  have  since  followed  him  into  the 
unknown  country  of  which  Hardie  used  to  speak  as  the 
"Beyond" — and  the  mourners  dispersed. 

z  373 


J.    KEIR   HARDIE 

Here  ends  the  work  of  the  present  writer.  He  has 
tried  to  tell  as  fully  as  possible  the  story  of  Keir  Hardie's 
life,  and  leaves  it  to  others  to  estimate  the  value  of  his 
work  and  example.  Time  itself  will  probably  prove 
to  be  the  truest  commentator,  and  it  is  the  firm  belief 
of  the  writer  that  the  passing  of  the  years  will 
establish  Keir  Hardie  as  one  of  the  permanently  historic 
figures  in  that  great  age-long  progressive  movement 
which  must  find  its  complete  realisation  in  the  establish- 
ment of  human  equality  on  a  basis  of  mutual  service 
by  all  members  of  the  human  family.  An  essential  part 
of  that  process  is  the  struggle  of  the  working  class  in 
all  countries  for  the  abolition  of  class.  In  directing  that 
struggle  Keir  Hardie  played  an  important  part  during 
an  important  period.  In  future  years,  whatever  may  be 
the  prevailing  form  of  society,  men  and  women  will 
have  to  turn  their  thoughts  back  to  that  period,  and  will 
find  James  Keir  Hardie  to  have  been  one  of  its  out- 
standing characters.  Perhaps  even  this  imperfect 
account  of  his  life  will  help  them  to  know  the  kind  of 
man  he  was,  and  to  visualise  the  environment  amidst 
which  he  lived.  That  his  worth  and  the  nature  of  his 
rendered  service  is  already  beginning  to  be  understood 
is  apparent.  The  monument  which  the  Ayrshire  miners 
are  erecting  is  only  one  of  the  signs  of  that  recognition. 
The  annual  Keir  Hardie  celebrations  held  by  the  Inde- 
pendent Labour  Party  is  another.  These  organisations 
themselves  stand  as  a  proof  of  his  courage,  foresight  and 
resolute  energy.  But  the  time  will  come  when  miners' 
unions  and  political  Labour  Parties  will  be  unnecessary, 
and  even  then  there  may  linger  some  dim  memory — 
traditional  it  may  be — of  an  incorruptible  man  of  the 
common  people,  who,  in  his  own  person,  symbolised  the 
idea  of  independence,  and  in  his  message  proclaimed 
the  practicability  of  Brotherhood. 

374 


CHRONOLOGY 

AND 

INDEX 


CHRONOLOGY 


1856. 

J.    Keir    Hardie    born    (August    i5th). 

1866. 
In    the    mine.     Trapper. 

1879. 

Marries  Miss  Lillie  Wilson  (June  3rd). 
Appointed      Corresponding      Secretary, 

Hamilton   Miners    (July  3rd). 
Appointed   Miners'   Agent    (August). 

1880. 
Miners'  Strikes  in  Lanarkshire. 

1881. 
Ayrshire   Miners'    Strike    (October). 

1882. 

Joins  staff  of  "Ardrossan  Herald"  and 
"Cumnock    News." 

1884. 

Franchise  Act :   Household  and  lodger 
franchise  extended  to  the  counties. 

1886. 

Ayrshire       Miners'        Union       formed. 

Appointed   Organising-  Secretary. 
Scottish     Miners'     Federation     formed. 

Appointed    Secretary. 

1887. 

No.  i  of  "The  Miner"  issued  (January). 
Ayrshire  Miners   declare    for  a  Labour 

Party. 
Adopted      as      miners'      candidate     for 

North   Ayrshire. 

Udston  Colliery  Disaster  (May). 
First      attendance      at     Trades     Union 

Congress,    Swansea    (September). 
Speech   at  Irvine  (October). 


1888. 


(April 


3,847 

2,917 

617 


Mid-Lanarkshire       By-elaction 
27th).       Result  :— 

J.  W.  Phillips  (L)  

W.  R.   Bousfield  (C)  .. 
J.  Keir  Hardie  (Lab)  .. 

Declines    Sir   George   Trevelyan's   offer 

of   £300    a    year   from    the    Liberal 

Party. 
Scottish    Parliamentary    Labour    Party 

formed  (August  25th). 
Attends     International     Trades     Union 

Congress,    London    (November). 


Attends   International    Congress,    Paris. 

First    No.    of    the    "Labour      Leader" 

(monthly)    issued    (February). 

1892. 

General  Election.  Elected  for  West 
Ham  (South).  Result: 

J.  Keir  Hardie  (I.L.P.)    5,268 
Maj.    G.    E.    Banes   (C)    4,036 

Refuses      financial       help      from      Mr. 

Andrew  Carnegie. 
First    question    in    Parliament    (August 

i8th). 
Declines    ^"300  a  year  offered   by    the 

Misses  Kippen. 

l893. 

Presides  at  Conference  at  Bradford  at 
which  the  Independent  Labour 
Party  is  established  (January  I3th 
and  1 4th). 

First  speech  in  Parliament  (February 
7th). 

Hull  Dock  Strike. 


376 


CHRONOLOGY 


1894. 


4.750 

3.975 


Elected  Chairman  of  I.L.P.,  Manches- 
ter Conferencg  (February  2nd 
and  3rd). 

"Labour   Leader"    issued    weekly 
from  March  3ist. 

Visits    Ireland. 

l895. 

General  Election,  Defeated  for  West 
Ham  (South).  Result: 

Maj.    G.    E.    Banes    (C) 
J.  Keir  Hardie  (I.L.P.) 
First  visit   to  America. 
Refuses    offer   of    $100,000    to    commit 
the     I.L.P.     to     support     of      Bi- 
metallism. 

1896. 

Attends     International     Socialist     Con- 
gress,   London   (July). 
Boggart    Hole    Ciough     Free     Speech 

Agitation. 

Bradford  East  By-election  (November 
loth).  Result : 

Capt.    Hon.    R.    H.    F. 

Greville  (C)   4,921 

A.    Billson   (L)    4,526 

J.   Keir  Hardie  (I.L.P.)     1,953 

1898. 
South   Wales    Miners'  Strike. 

1899. 

War  with  the  South  African  Re- 
publics. 

1900. 

Scottish  Workers'  Representation 
Committee  established,  Free 
Gardeners'  Hall,  Edinburgh 
(January  6th). 

Labour       Representation        Committee 
established,    Memorial    Hall,    Lon- 
don  (February  27th). 
Resigns    Chairmanship    of     I.L.P.     at 
^        Conference  held  at  Glasgow   (April 

1 6th  and  i7th). 

Contests      Preston      and     Merthyr      at 
General   Election.      Results  : 
Preston — 

R.  W.  Hanbury  (C)   ...     8,944 
W.    E.     M.     Tomlinson 

(C)      8,067 

J.  Keir  Hardie  (I.L.P.)    4,834 


Merthyr  — 

D.  A.  Thomas  (L)  .....  8,598 
J.  Keir  Hardie  (Lab)...  5,745 
W.  Fritchard  Morgan 

(L)       ......................     4.004 

1901. 

Moves  Socialist  resolution   in   House  of 

Commons  (April  23rd). 
Taff  Vale  judgment. 

1902. 

Death  of  father  and  mother  (April). 
South   African  War  ends   (June). 
Holiday  on  the  Continent  after  illness. 

^OS- 

Presides  at  Unemployed  Conference  at 
the    Guildhall,    London     (February 


Undergoes    operation     for    appendicitis. 
Gives    up     editorship   of     the   "Labour 

Leader"  and  transfers  paper  to  the 

I.L.P.    (December). 


1904. 

Visits     Continent    to    recuperate    after 

illness. 
Attends     International     Socialist     Con- 

gress  at  Amsterdam. 

1906. 

General  Election.  Re-elected  for 
Merthyr.  Result  : 

D.  A.   Thomas  (L)   .........     13>97i 

J.  Keir  Hardie  (L.R.C.)  ...  10,187 
H.  Radcliffe  (L)  ............  7,776 

Visits   Ireland. 

Chairman  of  the  Parliamentary  Labour 
Party. 

Fiftieth  birthday  celebration.  Presenta- 
tion at  Memorial  Hall,  London. 

1907. 

Re-elected     Chairman     of    the    Parlia- 

mentary Labour  Party. 
Publishes         "From         Serfdom         to 

Socialism." 
Left     Liverpool     for    tour    round    the 

world  (July    i2th). 
International         Socialist         Congress, 

Stuttgart. 


377 


CHRONOLOGY 


1908. 

Return  from  world  tour.  Welcome 
Home  meeting  at  the  Albert  Hall, 
London  (April  5th). 

Election  for  Lord  Rectorship  of  Glas- 
gow University  (October).  Result  : 

Lord  Curzon  ....  947 
Lloyd  George  ...  935 
Keir  Hardie  ....  122 

Omitted  from  invitation  to  the  King's 
Garden  Party. 

Attends  Dominion  Trades  Union  Con- 
gress in  Nova  Scotia  (September). 

1909. 

Chairman   Labour  Party. 

Publishes  "India:  Impressions  and 
Suggestions." 

Resigns  from  National  Council  I.L.P. 
(April). 

Attends  Young  Egyptian  Party  Con- 
gress, Geneva. 

Osborne  Judgment. 

1910. 

General  Election  (January).  Merthyr 
result : 

E.   R.   Jones  (L)    15,448 

J.    Keir    Hardie   (Lab)  13,841 

A.   C.  Fox  Davies  (C)  4,756 
W.    Pritchard    Morgan 

(I-L)       3,639 

Presides    at    Labour    Party  Conference, 

Newport   (January). 
Visits   France — speaks   at    Lille. 
Proposes     establishment     of      Socialist 

Daily   Paper. 

Attends      International     Socialist     Con- 
gress, Copenhagen   (September). 
General  Election  (Dacember).     Merthyr 

result : 

E.   R.   Jones  (L)    12,258 

J.    Keir    Hardie    (Lab)     11,507 
J.    H.  Watts   (C)  5,277 

International  Demonstration  at  the 
Albert  Hall,  London  (December). 

1911. 

Re-elected    to  I.L.P.   National  Council. 
Railway  Strike. 


1912. 

Visits   America   and  Canada. 
Attends     International     Socialist     Con- 
gress at  Basle  (November). 


Re-elected      Chairman      I.L.P.,      Man- 

chester Conference  (March). 
Attends     International     Women's     Suf- 

frage       Alliance        Congress        at 

Budapest  (June). 
Attends    funeral    of    Rebel    at    Zurich 

(August). 
Visits    Dublin    at    invitation     of    Irish 

Transport      Workers'       Federation 

(September). 
Attends      Congress       German       Social 

Democratic        Party        at        Jena 

(September). 
International     Demonstration     at     the 

Kingsvvay    Hall,    London    (Decem- 

ber). 

1914. 

Presides  at    Coming-of-Age  Conference 

of  the  I.L.P.,  Bradford  (April). 
Attends  meeting   International  Socialist 

Bureau,   Brussels  (July   29th). 
Assassination    of    Jaures    (July    3ist). 
Germany     declares     War     on     Russia 

(August  ist). 
Trafalgar  Square  Peace  Demonstration 

(August  2nd). 
Speech  in   House  of  Commons  (August 

3rd). 
War       declared         against       Germany 

(August  4th). 
Hostile    meeting    at    Aberdare    (August 

6th). 
Responsive    meetings    in    Merthyr    and 

other  towns  (October). 


Last   speech    in    Parliament   (February 

5th). 
Passed  peacefully  away  in   presence  of 

his   wife  and  daughter  (September 

26th). 
Funeral      at      Maryhill      Crematorium 

(September  29th). 


378 


INDEX 


Aberdarc       346,  348,  349 

Aberdeen       127 

Abraham,   Wm.    ("Mabon") 

21,  28,  47,  136 
Adler,  Victor 

60,  209,  210,  323,    329,  334 

Adult    Suffrage)    League 215 

Africa,    South — see  South    Africa. 

"Age   of  Reason"   6 

Albert  Hall   260,  307 

Albion  Colliery  Explosion   88,   138 

Allan,    Robert    153 

Amendment  to  Address   77,  101 

America,  Hardie  in     no,  248,  274,  319 
American   Labour  Day  Committee     no 

Amsterdam     Congress    208 

Anarchism      122,   123 

Anarchists  in   Spain   131 

Anderson,   W.    C 330,  339,  373 

Annbank  brass  band  14 

Anseele,    Eduard  48,  60 

Anti-militarism     230 

Anti-War  Strike,    50,     124,    298; 

German   Socialists  and  302 

Applegarth,    Robert    58 

Arbroath        98 

Arch,    Joseph    62 

Ardrossan   Herald    18,  34 

Armenia      286 

Army  Bill  243,  247 

Arran      371 

Asquith,   H.  H 145,  222,  263 

Aftercliffe       91 

Auchinleck    School    Board    31 

Australia,  Visit  to  254,  255 

Aveling,    Dr 74 

Ayrshire  12,  22,  26 

Ayrshire  Miners'  Union    13,   19,  31,  95 
Ayrshire  Post   36 

Bakunin      123 

Balfour,    Arthur  181,   187,  216,  292 

Balkan    States    321,  322 

Ballachulish       194 

Banes,   Major   201 


Bantock,    Granville    336 

Bantock,    Mrs 336 

Barnard   Castle    198 

Barnes,  G.  N 196,  225,  288,  354 

Barr,    John    223,318,  349 

Barrowman,   A 169 

Basle       321 

Bax,     Belfort    212 

Bebel,  August  ...  46,  60,  209,  275,  323 

Beer,    Max    278 

Belfast    235,  333 

Bell,  R 157,  173 

Bengal,   Partition  of   249,  252 

Benn,    J.    W 103 

Benson,   T.    D 198,  373 

Bernstein,    Eduard    121,  208,  273 

Besant,   Mrs.   Annie    48,  59 

Biddulph,   Sir  M 175 

Bimetallism   115,   116 

Birmingham    133,   149 

Black,    David   204 

Black,  W.   F.   195,  204 

"Black    Rod"   175 

Blackburn       143,  361 

Blatchford,  Robert 

74,  106,  251,  271,  281,  282,  301 

Boer  War   143,  192 

"Boggart  Hole    Clough"   case   ...     126 

Bomba,   King    286 

Bondfield,    Margaret    344 

Boston    Evening    Transcript    367 

Bordighera      205 

Bowman,    Guy    314 

Bradford    45,  73,  162,  335 

Bradford  East,  Candidature  at  ...     127 

Bradlaugh,    Charles    70 

Brailsford,    H.   N 357,  358 

Bright,    John    70 

Broadhurst,    H 47,  95,  96 

Brocklehurst,    Fred    126 

Brown,    Africanus    206 

Brown,    Robert    28 

Brussels    329,  339,  340,  346 

Bryan,  W.  J 116 

Bryce,   James  (Lord    Bryce)      145,  152 


379 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


PAGE 

Budapest       329 

Burgess,    Joseph   72,  74, 

99,  144,  150,  153,  166,  168,  262 

Burns,  John   48,  54, 

59.    65,   72,    76,    79,    82,    95, 

121,      145,     173,      178,     2O2,     221,     358 

Burns,  John   (of  Glasgow)  297 

Burns,    Robert    6,   19,  70 

Burrows,    H 59,   121,  259,  344 

Burt,  Thomas  21,  28,  47,  50,  59 

Butte   City,    The  Piper  of  117 

Buttery,   A.   W 74 

Cadbury,   Edward   165 

Cadzow    Collieries    9 

Camelinat      336 

Campbell,   Rev.   R.   J 242,  259 

Campbell-Bannerman,    Sir    H. 

145,  221,  263 

Canada,    Hardie   in   248,  274,  319 

Cannan,  Gilbert  358 

Canovas,   Assassination   of   131 

"Capitalist    War,    A"    151 

Cardiff  Dock  Bill   88 

««•  Carnegie,    Andrew    66,   137 

Carnegie,    John    153 

Carnot,    President    88 

Carrington,    Lord    147 

Carson,   Sir  Edward  333,  338 

Carson,   G 74,  105,   153,  372 

"Cat    and   Mouse"    Bill    326 

Chamberlain,    Joseph    199 

Champion,    H.     H 55 

Chapman,   Miss    48 

Chartered   Company    of   S.    Africa     146 

Chicago   no,  115,  319 

Children,    Meals   for   227,  281 

Chinese    Labour   in    South   Africa     192 

Christie,    G.    S 74 

Churchill,  Winston  ...  231,  294,  304,  309 

Cilfynydd       88 

City  Socialist  Circle  i/i 

Civil    List    178 

Clarion,    The  271,  278,  282 

Clark,  Dr.  G.  B 44,  161 

Clarke,    Sir    Edward    144 

Clarke,    William    128 

Class    War   210,  212,  218 

Clitheroe  by-election,   1902   193 

Coates,    Fred    297 

"Collier    Laddies"    98 

Colne    Valley    247 

Combination    Laws 62 

"Coming    of    Age"     Conference, 

Bradford    326,  335 

"Common  Sense  About  the  War"    358 


PAGE 

Communist    League    60 

Communist    Manifesto    58,  213 

Communists,   Free  123 

Compulsory  Military  Service      228,  293 
Conference,          Edinburgh,          on 

Labour  Representation  153 

Conference,    Guildhall,    on    Unem- 
ployment,   1903    196 

Conference,      I.L.P.,      see      Inde- 
pendent Labour  Party. 
Conference,     Memorial     Hall,    on 
labour    representation,    154;    on 

unemployment   154 

Congested  Districts   Board    225 

Congo,    Belgian    262,  286 

Congress,    International,    London, 
122  j   Zurich,    122  ;   Amsterdam, 
208;    Copenhagen,    298;    Basle     321 
Congress,      Trades      Union,      see 
Trades'  Union    Congress. 

Connolly,  James    56,   332 

Conscription    228,  293 

Conway,      Katherine      St.      John 

(Mrs.    Bruce   Glasier)    74,  336 

Conybeare,    C.    A.    V 21,  42 

Co-operative    Movement        27,  106,  184 

Copenhagen    Congress    298 

Courtney,    Leonard    161 

Cowes      286 

Craigie    Hill    15,    22 

Creimer,    W.    R 79 

Crewe,    Lord    222 

Crooks,    Will    198,  219,  226 

Crowley,    Fred    314 

Cumnock  13,    15,   169,    197,  346 

Cumnock    News   17,   18,  34 

Curran,  Pete   56,  74,  247 

Curzon,    Lord   259 

Czar,   Visit  to  Cowes  286 

Daily    Citizen    358 

Daily    Herald   343 

Davies,    Di  ....    139,   168,  223,  318,  349 

De   Beers    146 

De    Leon,    Daniel    113 

Debs,  Eugene  V 115,  274,  318 

Defence  of  the  Realm  Act  362 

Derby    235,  238 

Despard,    Mrs 344 

Devonport,    Lord     314 

Dewsbury 262 

Dickinson,    Mr 238 

Dilke,    Sir    Charles    103 

Disarmament,    Labour    Party   and     228 
Dock   Strike,    Hull,    81  ;   London, 

54,  62,  314 


380 


INDEX 


PAGE 

Dixie,   Lady   Florence    40 

Donaldson,    Robert    297 

Dowlais    Ironworks    310 

Dresden    Conference    of     German 

Party       208 

Drew,   W.   H 74 

Dryburgh,    G 169 

Dublin    98,  331 

Duma,  Socialist  members  of  368 

Dundee    96,  150,  195,  262 

Dundee    Advertiser    195 

Dunfermlinei      u 

Echo      104 

Eddlewood       12 

Edinburgh    27,  149,   150,  153,  283 

Edinburgh   Evening    News   145 

jEdwards,  John     176 

Egypt      288,  313 

Eight  Hours'  Bill,  Miners 

21,    22,    28,    87,    96,    28l 

Emergency   Unemployment  Bill...     281 

lEngels,  F.     213 

Engineers'  Lock-out  131 

Entente     Cordiale     228 

Evangelical    Union    Church    8,  17 

Fabian  Society  59,  73,  157,  182,  210,  315 

Factory    Inspectors     81 

Fair  Wages  Clause    310 

Fawcett  Association    80,  99 

Pels,    Mr 274 

Fen  wick,  Charles  21,  28,  47,  59 

Ferguson,   John    42,  44 

Fisher,   Andrew      20,  254 

Fisher,  Lord  271 

Fletcher,    A.   E 165 

Ford,   Isabella  0 198 

Forson,  Rev.  A.  M 373 

Forward,    The  259 

"Fourth  Clause,  The"  106,  108 

Franchise  Act,    1884  20,  66 

Francis,  LI.  138,  163,  168,  223,  318,  349 

Franck,   Ludwig     373 

Free  Speech     22,  54,  125 

Free  Trade,  Hardie  on  200 

French      Socialists       attitude      to 

International         208,  209 

"From   Serfdom  to  Socialism"  ...     240 

Gardner,  Councillor  Ben  86 

"Gavroche" 204 

General  Election,   1895,   I05.    109; 
1900,     162,     174;     1906,    221; 

1910,   290 


PAGE 

General     Strike,     32 ;     Anti-War, 

50,  124,  298,  302 

Geneva        228 

George,   Henry    65 

George,  Lloyd 

145,  150,  162,  222,  259,  290,  309,  369 
German   Socialists  and  the  Inter- 
national,   208  ;    anti-war    strike, 
302  ;   Morocco,   312  ;    Hardie  at 
Jena,    Congress    of,    333 ;     and 

the  War,  340 
Germany,  Labour  Party  and,  228 ; 

press  campaign   against,  271 

Gilchrist,  Alex 204,  372 

Gladstone,  W.  E. 

21,  42,  67,  71,  103,  286 

Gladstone,  Lord  331 

Glasgow,  40,  73,  149,  157,  171,  259,  362 

Glasgow    Daily    Mail    36 

Glasgow    Weekly  Mail  10 

Glasier,  J.   Bruce  44,  55, 

99,  125,  126,  144,  146,  153,  157, 
163,  182,  198,  233,  238,  258,  283, 

321,  336,  339.  348.  372,  373 

jrlasier,  Mrs.  Bruce  74,  336 

Glasier,  Miss  Lizzie  297 

Glasse,    Rev.  J 205 

Good   Templars    7,   18 

Gorst,  Sir  John  79,  103,  196 

Gossip,    Alex    297 

Government,     Socialist    participa- 
tion  in    208 

Graham,   R.   B.   Cunninghame...  21, 
44.  51*  54.  59.  86,  251,  259,  344,  373 

Grayson,   Victor     247,   259, 

261,    262,    266,    268,    276,    281,    283 
Grey,  Sir  Edward 

145,  286,  312,  328,  344,  348,  368 

Guesde,    Jules    60,  208 

Guest,    Keen    &   Nettlefold    310 

Guildhall     Conference    on    Unem- 
ployment (1903)   196 

(iuthrie,   Arthur   18 

Haase,     H 340 

Haddow,    Sandy    c6,  372 

Haddow,   W.    M. 

150,   153.   171,  204,  372 

Haggard,   H.   Rider  133 

Haldane,   Lord 

222    228,  247,  293,  304,  309 

Hall,    Leonard    107 

Hamburg    Dock    Strike    131 

Hamilton       IO,  363 

Harcourt,   Sir    William 

71,  88,  101,   103,  108,  145 


381 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


Hardie, 
Hardie, 
Hardie, 
Hardie, 
Hardie, 


PAGE 

Agnes  28,  187,  274 

David    i 

Duncan    28,  371 


George  D  ..............  86, 

James   .....................   28, 


372 
271 


Hardie,    Mrs.    J.    Keir 

13,   168,   274,   337,  37i 
Hardie,   James    Keir — 

Boyhood      I 

First  Trade    Union  meeting    ...  2 

Autobiographical    Note    3 

Trapper,       pit       pony       driver, 

hewer      5.  6>  7 

Joins      Good      Templars       and 

Evangelical  Union  Church  ...  7 

Dismissed  as  an  agitator  8 

Tobacconist  and  Stationer   10 

Press  correspondent    10 

Lanarkshire  Miners'  Union 10 

Miners'    Agent    

Marriage       

Ayrshire   Miners'   Union    13,  31 

On  Staff  of  Cumnock  News,     17,  34 

Joins   Liberal   Association    i£ 

Lay   Preacher    J9 

Scottish  Miners'  Federation 20 

Speech   at   Irvine    2 

Class    loyalty    24,  25 

Founds    The    Miner    2Q 

Mid-Lanark    by-election    35 

Scottish  Labour  Party   43 

Resolutions       at      International 

Conference,    1888     49 

Impression  of,  by  Cunninghame 

Graham      51 

At       1889      Congress      (Second 

International)       59  i 

Elected  for  West  Ham  64 

Political   independence   64 

His   Cloth    Cap   7* 

Amendment  to  the  Address  ...  77,  101 

On   Policy    of    the   I.L.P.,    1894  86 
Protest         on        congratulatory 
motion    on   birth    of    Duchess 

of  York's  child    89 

Views    on    Monarchy    89 

At   T.U.    Congress    94 

"Member  for  the  Unemployed'^'  104 

Opposition  to  "Fourth   Clause"  106 
Defeat  at  West  Ham,   1895     108,   109 

Visits    America    no 

Bimetallist  bribe  offer   n6 

Financial    relations   with   move- 
ment     


PAGE 

Bardie,  James   Keir — (continued) 

As  controversialist   129,  130 

Christmas    Message,     1897    132 

As  propagandist  134 

Retires   from   I.L.P.   Chairman- 
ship             157 

Tribute  of  Bruce  Glasier  158 

Elected    for    Merthyr    166 

On  Daath  of  Queen  Victoria  ...     176 
Attitude  to  Monarchy  ...  89,   178,  268 
Socialism,  Resolution  in  Parlia- 
ment             1 86 

Parents'    Death    187 

At   Nevill's  Court    189 

In    Paris    *94 

At      Guildhall      Conference      on 

Unemployment      196 

On  Socialist  tactics  ...  209,  211,  212 
Distrust  of  Liberal  Imperialists  228 
Resolution  on  Women's  Suffrage  231 
Reception  at  Memorial  Hall  ...  232 
Chairman  Parliamentary  Labour 

Party       236 

"From    Serfdom   to    Socialism"     240 

"Ragged"    at   Cambridge    242 

Report  on  Army  Bill     P. 243 

Breakdown   in   Health   244 

Voyage  round  the  world  247 

"India  :    Impressions    and   Sug- 
gestions"             252 

Lord   Rectorship   nomination    ...     259 

At    Albert    Hall    260 

In   Nova  Scotia   274 

A   week's  work   282 

Resignation    from    N.A.C 284 

On  underground  agitation   288 

Chairman  of  Labour  Party  292 

His  love  for  children     296 

At  Copenhagen  Congress  2qS 

At  Lille      303 

Rhondda  Valley  Strike  3°4 

Merthyr  Election,  1910  3°5 

Morocco    Debate     312 

Merthyr    I.L.P.    Conference    ....     317 

Revisits    America    3J9 

At    Basle    Congress    323 

Support  of  Women's  Movement     326 

In    Ireland    331 

At  Jena  Congress   333 

Speech  on  Outbreak  of  War  ...     344 

On    Recruiting    352 

Last  Speech  in  Parliament  363 


H9»  l83 
Tribute  from  Stepniak  121 


Henderson,   Arthur 


382 


INDEX 


PAGE 

Highland   Land   League   ............       40 

Hill,    John     ..............................     369 

"History  of  Labour  Representa- 

tion"   ....................................     155 

"History  of  our  own  Times"   ...       54 
Hobson,    Charles     .....................       91 

Hobson,    J.    A.    ........................     152 

Hobson,   S.   G  ......................   70,   97 

Hocking,    Silas    ........................     148 

Hodge,    John    ,  ..........................     169 

Holland,  Canon  Scott  ...............     148 

Holytown   .................................        7 

Home   Colonies    ........................       78 

Home   Rule   ............   36,   42,   242,   338 

Howell,   George  ........................       58 

Huddersfield     ...........................    261 

Hughes    Family,   The    ...............     349 

Hull  Dock  Strike  .....................       81 

Hulton  Colliery  Disaster  ,  ...........     307 

Hutchison,  Robert  ..................  44,  56 

Huysmans,   Camille  ............  329,  336 

Hyndman,  H.  M  ................  59 

230,  259,  271,  275,  277,  281,  282,  301 

Independent  Labour  Party  ...43, 
67.  7i»,73,  97,  106,  139,  143,  161, 

182,  200,  223,  283 

I.L.P.  Conferences,  Bradford, 
l893>  73  5  Manchester,  1894,  83  ; 
Newcastle,  1895,  105;  Birming- 
ham, 1898,  133;  Leeds,  1899, 
140;  Glasgow,  1900,  157;  Brad- 
ford, 1900,  162  ;  Leicester,  1901, 
183;  Derby,  1907,  235,  238; 
Huddersfield,  1908,  261  ;  Edin- 
burgh, 1909,  283;  Merthyr,  1912, 
317;  Manchester,  1913,  326; 
Bradford,  1914,  335  ;  Norwich, 

19*5,  367 
I.L.P.,  Hardie  on  Policy  of  ......       86 

I.L.P.,   Title,    proposed   alteration     105 
Independent     Parliamentary     La- 

bour Group  ...........................     156 

India   ..................    160,  248,  249,  262 

"India:  Impressions  and  Sugges- 

tions"   .................................       252 

"Indictment  of  the  Class  War"...     212 
Industrial  Unionists  ..................       49 

Insurance  Bill  ...........................     316 

International,  First  ...............  61,   123 

International,  Second  ............  61, 

208,  249,  342,  343 
International  Conference,  London, 

46;   Paris,   59,   61 
International      Socialist      Bureau 


334,    339. 


PAGE 

International  Socialist  Congress  : 
Zurich,  1892,  122 ;  London,  1896, 
122 ;  Amsterdam,  1904,  208; 
Copenhagen,  1910,  298;  Basle, 

1912,    321 
International    Women's     Suffrage 

Alliance  329 

International      Working       Men's 

Association    58 

Ireland  ...42,  66,  98,  108,  225,  331,  338 

Irish  Party  179,  181 

Irish  Transport  Workers'  Federa- 
tion    331 

Irvine       22,  23 

Irving,   Dan      339 

Japan     210 

Jarrovv       y '247 

Jaures,  Jean  208,  209,  212 

301,  307,  323,  324,  334,  340,  373 

Jena    333 

"Jim"  short  story  297 

Johannesburg  256,  257,  330 

Johnson,    Francis    198 

Johnson,    William    74 

Johnston,    Thomas     259 

Jones,    Edgar    304 

Jowett,  F.  W 74 

99,    198,    224,    336,    349,    373 
Justice      129 

Kautsky,    Karl   209,  275 

Keir,    John    , 153 

Keir,   Mary   i 

Kennedy,   Charles  44 

Kennedy,  J.   C , 74 

Kenney,    Annie    231 

Kenworthy,   John   K 90 

King  Edward. ..177,   201,  263,  269,  294 

King's  garden  party  268 

King's   Visit   to   Russia    264 

Kippen,   The  Misses   69,   70,  235 

Kitchener,    Lord     352 

Knights   of  Labour,   U.S. A 55 

"Kopje"    145 

Kropotkin 121,  122 

Kruger,    President    206 

Labour  Day  Committee,  American     no 
Labour   Electoral   Association 

24,  39,  4i,  55 

Labour    Exchanges    196 

Labour    Institute,    Bradford    73 

Labour   Leader    30,    75,   85, 

93,  113,  119,  120,  131,  132,  135, 

136,   141,  203,  285,  350,  365 


383 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


PAGE 

Labour  Members'  salaries   283 

Labour      Parliamentary       Group, 

Hardie's   Resolution  for   156 

Labour  Party 

22,  97,   i53»  17°.  224,  227,  228, 

235,  244,  282,  287,  292,  306,  330 

Labour  Party  for  Scotland  43 

"Labour   Representation,    History 

of"      155 

Labour  Representation  Committee 

i53>  J57»  I6l»  l62»  J73»  ^2,  193. 

199,    210,    223,    235 

Ladysmith      257 

Lanark,    Mid 35,   85 

Lanark,    Mid,    Election    Address         37 

Lanark,   N.E 186 

Lanarkshire  Miners'  Union     9 

Land    Restoration    League    65,70 

Langley,    Batty    91 

Lansbury,    George    306,    318,    343 

Larkhall    44 

Larkin,    Jim    332 

Law,    Bonar   225,   315,   338 

Lawrence,  Mrs.   Pethick  327 

L'dzzari    48 

Ledebour,    Georg    275,  301 

Leeds    140,    149,    216,    217 

Leeds    Mercury   179 

Leicester    99,    183 

Leon,    Daniel    de    113 

Leopold,    King    262 

Lewis,    Matt    , 347,    349 

Liberal   Imperialism   228,  267 

Liberal-Labour    Leaders    95 

Liberal  Party    18, 

21,   23,   24,   26,   35,   64,   86,   87, 
91,   108,   152,  223,  228,  267,  348,  363 
Liberal    Programme,    Nottingham       37 

Liebknecht,  William  46,  60,  213 

Lille       303 

Lipton,    Sir   T 137 

Lister,    John     74 

Littlewood,    France    144. 

Liverpool       in 

Llanelly       309 

Lloyd,    H.    D no 

Lloyd   George,   see  George. 

London  City   Socialist  Circle  171 

London  Dock  Strike  62,  314 

Long,    Walter   217 

Loreburn,  Lord   145,  222,  358 

Lowe,  David         87,   141,   150,   195,   204 

"Mabon"     21,  28,  47,  136 

McArthur,    Archibald    297 

Macarthur,   Mary   215,  289,  344 


PAGE 

McCarthy,    Justin    54 

MacDonald,    Alex  10,   n 

MacDonald,    J 155 

MacDonald,    J.    Ramsay 39, 

91,  92,  99,  144,  146,  155,  157, 
183,  198,  200,  205,  209,  224, 
244,  247,  263,  280,  283,  312, 

344,  '345,   348,    349,   353,    357,  373 

MacDonald,    Margaret    238,  313 

Mackley,    Tom    319 

McNab,   Clarice   297 

Macpherson,    Duncan    43 

Macpherson,   Fenton   131 

Malatesta,   Enrico  121 

Manchester    .%.    32,  126,  135,  149 

Manchester    Guardian    145 

Mann,   Tom   84, 

86,   123,   125,   127,   131,  134,  314 

Manningham    Mills     62 

Martineau    Unitarian   Church    ....  368 

Martyn,    Caroline    125 

Marx,   Karl    58,  123 

"Marxian"    202,  204 

Marxians      and      Revisionists     in 

Germany    208,  209 

Mason,   Stephen    21,  35 

Match  Girls'    Union   48 

Maxton,    James    354 

Maxwell,    J.    Shaw    44,  74 

Meals  for  Children  227,  281 

Memorial     Hall     Conference      on 
Labour  Representation,  154  ;  on 

Unemployment      154 

Merthyr    138,   162, 

167,    224,    292,   305,   317,   348,  357 

Merthyr  Pioneer  311,  348,  365 

Middle   Class,   Workers    and   213 

Mid-Lanark,    see    Lanark,    Mid. 
Militarism,  Hardieon,    177,  229,  293,317 

Militarism,  Labour  Party  and  ...  244 
Military  in  Strike  Areas 

Si,   137,  304,  309 

Mills,    W.    T 307 

.Milwaukee       115 

Miner,   The    20,  26,  29,  33,  35 

Miners'  Association,  Hardie  and  94 
Miners'  Union,  Ayrshire  13,  19,  31,  95 
Miners'  Eight  Hours  Day  Bill 

21,    22,.  28,    87,    96,    28l 

Miners'      Federation      of      Great 

Britain    33,  281,  293 

Miners'   National    Union   32 

Miners',  Scottish,  Strike  (1894)     88,  93 

Miners',    Welsh,   Strikes   136,  304 

Mines    Bill    28 

Mines,  Nationalisation  of  93,  94 


384 


INDEX 


PAGE 

Mines,    Safety    in    294 

Minimum    Wage    78 

Mitchell,     Goorge    44 

Molkenbuhr       3°7 

Monarchy,  Hardie  and  ...  89,  178,  268 

Montrose    Burghs    262  | 

Morel,    E.   D 358 

Morgan,    Pritchard    166,  167,  291 

Morley,      John      (Lord       Morley) 

108,    145,    161,    181,    222,   358,  365 

Morning  Leader  145 

Morning    Post    128 

Morocco       312 

Morris,    William 

56,  59,  121,  223,  318,  349 

Morse,    Sydney    H 191 

Mountain    Ash    357 

Muller,    Herman     336 

Municipal    Socialism,     Hardie    on  184 

Murdoch,   John   43 

Murphy,    W.    M 332 

Naoroji,    D 211 

Nationalisation  of  Mines  93,  94 

National   Labour    Party   39 

"National   Socialist  Party"    105 

National    Stop-the-War     Commit- 
tee   (1900)    149 

National  Union  of  Women's  Suf- 
frage   Societies    328 

Nazarbeck     121 

Neil,  James  19,   169,  373 

Nevill's   Court    189 

Newcastle      105 

Newspaper,  Daily,   Scheme  for  ...     305 

New   York    112 

New   York    World  114 

Nineteenth  Century  99,  211 

North  British   Railway  Bill   281 

Northern  Daily   Telegraph  361 

Norwich    94,  97,  367 

Nottingham    Liberal    Programme      37 
Nova    Scotia  274 

O'Connor,  T.  P 102,  128 

Odger,    George    58 

O'Grady,  James  265 

Old  Age  Pensions   157,  227 

Old  Quarry  10 

"Overtoun  Exposure"  140 

Overtoun,    Lord      141 

Outhwaite,  R.  L 330 

Pankhurst,    Adela   231 

Pankhurst,  Mrs.   126,  206,  327 

Paris    59,    61,   339 


PAGE 

Parker,  Evan  347,  349 

Parker,  James  144,  157,  198 

Parliament,  Trade  Unions  and  ...  96 
Parliamentary  Committee  of 

Trades  Union  Congress  155 

Parnell,  Charles  Stewart  69,  70 

Parnellite  Tactics  83 

"Patriotism  Measured  in  Millions"  366 

Pease,  E.  R 157 

Penny,  John 

133,  144,  153,  162,  163,  165,  167,  198 

Penrhiwceiber  357 

Penrhyn  Quarries  r.r.-n^  130 

Penty,  A.  J ... 191 

Penydarren  138,  163 

Phillips,  Dr.  Marion  344 

Phillips,  J.  W 37 

Pioneer,  Merthyr  311,  348,  365 

Pittsburg-  66 

Ponsonby,  Arthur 267,  358 

Portsmouth,  Lord  222 

Postal  Servants  99 

Preston  162,  167 

Pretoria  Pit  Disaster  307 

Priestman,  Arthur  165 

Primitive  Methodist  Church  368 

Progressive  Review  128 

Punch  250 

Queen  Victoria  88,   176 

Quelch,    Harry   56,  157 

"Races  of  the  World"  7 

Radcliffe,   Mr 223 

Railway   Bill,   North   British   281 

Railway  Strike,    1911,  Military  in 

308,  309 

Rand    Mines    257 

Rebel  Movement     60 

Reform    Bill    327 

Reformers1    Year  Book     176 

Reid,  Sir  R.  (Lord  Loreburn) 

145,  222,  358 

Resolution  for  Socialist  Common- 
wealth (H.   of  C.  23.4.01)  186 

Resolution     on     forming1     Labour 
Party,     22  ;     on     Labour     repre- 
sentation,      154 ;      on      Parlia- 
mentary   Labour    Group,     156 ; 

on  War  and  General  Strike,  298 

Restriction  of  Output  31 

Reval          263 

Review    of    Reviews    145 

Revisionists,    German     208,  209 

Rhondda,    Lord   167 

JRhondda  Valley,  Strike  in  ...  304,  308 


385 


J.  KEIR  HARDIE 


PAGE 

Richard,  Gerault     194 

Richard,    Henry    167 

Richardson,   Tom 

306,    346,    347,    349,    371 

"Rights  of  Man"   60 

Right   to  Work   227 

Roberts,    Lord    229,    293 

Robertson,  Chisholm       28,  51,  74 

Rogers,    E.    W 157 

Rollit,  Sir  Albert  103,   196 

Rosebery,    Lord   71,    85,    99,    145 

Royalty,   Hardie  and,     88,  89,   178,  268 

Russell,    Alfred    297 

Russell,    Bertrand    358 

Russia    210,    228, 

247,  261,  263,  267,  286,  293,  363,  368 

Russian    Seamen's    Union    368 

Rutherglen        140 

St.    Davids,    Lord   37 

Salaries    of    Labour    Members    ...     283 

Salvation  Army  m,  197,  243 

Sambourne,    Linley    250 

Samuel,    Herbert    129 

Sanderson,    Mrs.    Cobden    259 

San    Francisco     116 

Sarajevo    ,...     339 

Scanlon,    W 169 

Schnadhorst,    Mr 41 

School  Children,  Feeding  of  ...  227,  281 

Schreiner,    Cronwright     150 

Schreiner,    Olive     258 

Scott   Memorial   Church    368 

Scottish    Home    Rule   Association      39 
Scottish    Labour    Party    ...    43,    59,    73 

Scottish  Leader  36 

Scottish    Miners'    Strike    88,    93 

Scottish  Miners'  Federation   n,  20,  26 
Scottish     Parliamentary     Labour 

Party    44,    71 

Second    International,    see    Inter- 
national. 

Serbia    339 

"Serfdom  to  Socialism,  From"  ...     240 

Settle,    Alfred    74 

Sex  Equality,  Political  214 

Sexton,    J 74 

Shackleton,  David  193,  219,  226 

Shallard,   S.    D 125,    166 

Shaw,    George    Bernard 

25,  74,  259,  281,  358,  361 
Shawfield  Chemical  Works,  Strike 

at 140 

Shieldmuir    „..       10 

Shipton,    George    47 

Simcox,  Miss  Edith 47 


PAGE 

Sinn    Fein    , 225 

Sliding  Scale,  Miners'  137 

Small,    W 74 

Smart,    H.    Russell    74,    144,  153 

Smillie,  Robert 41,  44,  56, 

74,  85,  93,  150,  153,  186,  336,  344,  372 

Smith,    Adolph    48 

Smith,    Frank,     70,    91,    in,    no,  371 

Smith,   F.   E 333,  338 

Snowden,    Philip    98,    99 

144,  146,  183,  186,  198,  224,  233 

244,    252,    283,    289,    290,    328,  349 

Snowden,    Mrs 339 

Social    Democratic    Federation 

59,  71,  73,  123,  129,  162,  182,  210,  233 

Socialism   and   the    Labour   Party  292 
Socialism,  Continental,  and  Class 

War    2I8 

Socialism,    Hardie's    Attitude     to 

doctrinaires    130 

Socialism,     Hardie's      Resolution 

for,   in  Parliament   182 

Socialism,      International,    Albert 

Hall    Demonstration    307 

Socialism,    Municipal,    Hardie   on  184 

Socialist    League    27,    59 

Socialist    Sunday    Schools    297 

Socialist  Tactics,  Hardie  on 

209,    211,  212 
Socialists,  German,  and  Anti-War 

Strike    302 

Socialists,   German,   and   Morocco  312 

Sons  of  Labour  55 

South    Africa,     Chartered     Com- 
pany   of     146 

South  Africa,  Hardie  in  256 

South  African  War  143,  192 

South      Africa,       Labour       Party 

and  287,  330 

Southport    41 

Spain,    Anarchists    in    131 

"Splotch  of  Red,   A"   101 

Stacy,  Enid  125 

Standard,    The    165 

Stanhope,    Philip    193 

Stanton,   C.    B 165,  224 

Star,    The    36 

Steel    Smelters'    Association    40 

Stepniak    120 

Stewart,    Major    309 

Stewart,  W.  ("Gavroche")  204 

Stockport    268 

Stokes,    J 343 

Stonelake,  Councillor,  224,  318,  346,  349 
Strike,    General,    Against   War 

50,    124,    298,  302 


386 


INDEX 


PAGE 

Strikes,  Military  and,    81,  137,  304,  309 
Suffrage,    Women's 

214,    230,    235,    237,    289,  327 

Taff  Vale  Case  183,  186 

Tariff  Reform  199 

Taylor,    Tom    164 

Territorial   Army   Bill   243,  247 

Thomas,    D.    A.    (Lord   Rhondda)  167 

Thompson,  A.  M 165 

Thome,    W 140,  347 

Threlfall,    T.    R 39,    41 

Tillett,    Ben 74,    84,    97,  314 

Times,   The  128 

Tonypandy     304 

Tory    Gold    36 

Trades  Disputes  Act  227 

Trades  Union  Parliamentary  Fund  96 
Trade       Unions      and       "Fourth 

Clause"      106 

Trades  Union  Congress,  45,  59,  94,  154 

Trevelyan,   C.    P 358 

Trevelyan,  Sir  G 42 

Truck   System     28 

Udston  Colliery  Disaster     33 

Uitlanders      144 

Ulster  Volunteers   338 

"Underground  Russia"        120 

Unemployed  Workmen  Bill  ...  218,  220 
Unemployment,     63,    68,    77,    86, 

100,  118,  194,  216,  275,  281,  291 
Unemployment,      Guildhall      Con- 
ference,   1903    196 

Unemployment  Insurance     227 

Unified  Socialist  Party  (France)...  209 
Union     of    South    Africa,     Draft 

Constitution      287 

United    Irish    League    42 

U.S.A.   Electoral  Methods    115 

U.S.A.,   Hardie  in   no,    274,  319 

Vandervelde,  Emil 

209,  210,  301,  307,  334,  340 

verses    318,  319 

Vjenna 322,   329,    334,  339 

Vincent,  Col.   Howard  79 

Volkhovsky       121 

Vollmar       60 


Vorwarts 


PACE 
278 


Wakefield      

Wallace,   Dr.   Alfred    Russel   

Wallace,    Bruce   

Wallace,    Rev.   James    

"War,    A    Capitalist"    

War    Against    Poverty   Campaign 
War,     Anglo-German     Efforts     to 

Stem    272, 

War,    the  European   334, 

War,    Hardie    on    

"War   of   Steel   and   Gold,'  The" 

War,   South  African  143, 

Waterford      

Wedderburn,    Sir    William   

Weekly  Sun      

Weekly  Times  &>  Echo  

Weir,    J.    Galloway    

Weir,    John  

Wells,   H.   G 259,   280,  354, 

Welsh  Miners'  Strikes  136, 

Western  Mail  , 

West   Ham  65,  86,  87,    108, 

West     Ham,     Hardie 's     Election 

Address      

Whitehaven   Disaster     

Wilkie    (Shipwrights)    

Williams,    Robert    

Williams,  Robert,  F.R.I.B.A....I39, 

Wilson,  J.  Havelock  76 

Wilson,  K.  J 

Wilson,   Miss  Lillie  

Wilson,    Rev.    Stitt      

Women's    Enfranchisement   Bill... 
Women's      Social     and     Political 

Union  231,  236, 

Women's  Suffrage 

.         214,  230,  235,  237,  289, 

Woolwich     

Workman's  Times  

Wright,    Willie    136, 


1 86 

259 

70 

323 
315 
275 
133 

358 

192 

98 

23 

102 
90 
40 
28 

355 
304 
348 
140 

67 
294 

343 
19! 
,  82 
150 

259 
215 

238 

327 
198 

72 
139 


York  149 

York,  Duchess  of  89 

Young  Egyptian  Party  288 

Young,  John  205 

Zurich  122,  331 


387 


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